Becoming the Enemy
by Kallasilya
Summary: The turtles have spent their whole lives battling the Shredder, but now he is somewhere where they can't touch him: inside Raph's mind, and in control. Who is Ch'rell, and why is he so intent on the genocide of the Utrom? What atrocities lie in his past?
1. The voices in your head

_**Summary: **_The turtles have spent their whole lives battling the Shredder, but now he is somewhere where they can't touch him: inside Raph's mind, and in control. Who is Ch'rell, and why is he so intent on the genocide of the Utrom? What atrocities lie in his past?

_**A/n:**_ Kicking off at the beginning of a long story… I'd forgotten how exciting this was! :D

This story is a spin off from the end of the 'Secret Origins' story arc in season 2, when the TCRI building is destroyed and we first discover that Shredder is an Utrom. So this will be set pretty firmly in NT-verse, but (as always) my characterisation is informed by the CGI movie, as well. It will also draw strongly on material from the end of 'Exodus' in season 3, where Ch'rell is put on trial and convicted by the Utrom court (or 'high council', or whatever).

Grammatical note: I'm using 'Utrom' with a capital as the plural as well as the singular. If I slip up and use 'utroms', let's agree to blame it on the characters' bad grammar, okay? I've heard both words used as the plural in the show, so I don't think there's a standard term anyway.

Apologies for this a/n being almost as long as War and Peace. Now on to the story!

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_**Becoming the Enemy**_

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**Chapter 1 – The voices in your head**_**  
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**.:…:.  
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It had been a really long day – and that was an understatement. The several hours that they'd been absent from the TCRI building had actually consisted of three weeks of being chased across the intergalactic universe, fighting Triceratons and Federation troops and despair at the thought of never being able to make it back home. Then they'd been sucked into the Utrom's not-so-virtual reality device, where they'd had to battle the feudal Japanese version of Foot soldiers and defeat the Shredder's ancestor – who, it turned out, wasn't an ancestor at all but the one-and-only, who'd somehow managed to stay alive and annoying for almost a millennium.

And now, just when Raphael thought that things were finally settling down and he could go home, pass out on his hammock, and sleep for about a week, here was the Shredder blocking their way yet _again_, and saying something about how 'none of them would ever leave here alive'. Again.

Raphael was starting to get really pissed off.

And the Shredder didn't even care that he was going to get them all vaporised by the techno-organic virus in the implosion device that _he _had dropped – you know, the one that was going to go off in approximately one minute and twenty seconds. No, he was determined to see this stupid fight through to its futile end, destroying them all in the process.

_I guess he was pretty upset about missin' out on his revenge_, Raph thought to himself as he and his family battled grimly on, piercing Shredder's metal armour with their weapons. The Utrom and their Guardians were all safely on their way to their home world, after centuries of exile on Earth. Raphael was jealous – and Shredder was furious.

His fury blinded him to what was going on, but Raph knew that Don had a plan. Don always had a plan. Sure enough, sparks erupted between the two wires in Don's hands, and leaped towards the torn metal of Shredder's armour. Raph winced and leaned back, shielding his eyes from the bright flashes of electricity with one arm. He listened to their enemy screaming – in anger or in pain, he couldn't tell – but he didn't look up until he heard the almighty crash of Shredder's body hitting the floor.

He knew that even as they lingered, the timer on the implosion device was steadily ticking away, but they'd knocked Shredder down too many times before to assume he was out for the count.

And he was right; but it didn't happen the way he had expected, with Shredder staggering upright and lurching towards them like some kind of demented zombie. Instead, there was a hissing sound as the torso of Shredder's armour opened and slid aside, revealing not skin and flesh but a dark interior. Red eyes opened in the blackness.

Raphael had a very bad feeling about this.

_Something_ came crawling out of the armour.

"The Shredder's… an _utrom_?" Don exclaimed.

Michelangelo shrieked. "It's the prisoner dude! He's the one who… who…"

The thing opened its mouth and spoke. "Who escaped after causing Mortu's ship to crash on Earth a millennium ago."

Raphael reeled in shock, but he tried to keep his reaction internal. The Utrom in general weren't exactly a beautiful species, but the one who'd crawled out of the Shredder's armour made Raph shiver. It could have been the hideous scarring, or the sight of all those twisting tentacles, or perhaps it was just the expression on its face...

Raph swallowed past his revulsion. "He don't look so tough now. Let's just squish him," he said, smacking a fist into his palm for emphasis.

The tentacled creature seemed to tense, and Raph knew a moment of regret for his words.

It sprung at him with unbelievable force and speed, and he staggered backwards, giving a muffled yell as his face was covered by slimy flesh and grasping tentacles, blocking his vision and gagging his mouth. He stumbled wildly, trying to pull the disgusting alien creature away from his head. "Get it off me! _Get it off!_" he tried to yell to his brothers, but the Shredder's grip was so tight that the words hardly came out. He was suffocating, and worse, he knew that they must have less than twenty seconds to get their shells out of the building before the whole thing imploded.

He continued to yell and flail around, and the alien started to laugh at him, in a voice that was unmistakably the Shredder's. "What did you say? I can't seem to hear you!" In his panicked state, Raph almost thought he heard the words echoing inside his own mind.

Three-fingered hands grabbed him by the shoulders to steady him, and then Raph could feel a foot planted firmly in the centre of his chest. Leo pushed against him, and grunted as he tried with all his might to dislodge the thing on Raph's head. Even though his ears were covered with slime and god knew what else, Raph could still hear Mikey's yelp.

"Get it off! Or there's gonna be a tiny little Shredder alien bursting outta Raph's chest!"

Blinded, but guided by a lifetime of practice, Raph reached out to whack Mikey firmly over the back of the head. His aim was true, but it was physically harder than he thought it would be. His limbs were growing sluggish, and he felt disoriented and uncoordinated. What was going on? It couldn't be the lack of oxygen, he knew that he could hold his breath for longer than this…

He shuddered as he felt the Shredder-alien shifting on top of his head, and heard a snap of teeth and a yell of surprise from Leo. _We don't have time for this_, he thought frantically.

"We do not have time for this!" Splinter's sharp words echoed his thoughts. "Leave the Shredder! We shall take them both. Donatello-!"

"Done!" came Don's voice from across the chamber. "I've got the Transmat recalibrated. This bus is leaving!"

It was at that moment that Raphael felt the first tendrils of an alien presence probing inside his mind. _My, my_, came the Shredder's voice, _what do we have here?_

This time Raph was certain – the words hadn't been spoken aloud. They echoed inside his skull, thoughts which were not his own infiltrating his consciousness. The creeping horror of it made him freeze. For a few moments he was deaf to the cries of his family, the electronic hum of the Transmat, the ticking of the last few seconds on the implosion device. His world narrowed down until all he could feel was the force invading his thoughts.

_Do not stand against me,_ came the voice, effortlessly brushing past the flimsy mental barriers that Raph had desperately thrown up. _Your body and mind belong to me now. You will not succeed._

With a huge force of will, and a spike of panic-fuelled adrenaline, Raph raised his leaden arms and clawed at the thing on his head. "No… Get out! _Get out!_"

"_Raph!_" screamed Mikey, "It's time to go!"

_What an excellent suggestion,_ thought the voice that wasn't his. Raphael ordered his legs to move.

Nothing happened. Why was his body failing him? _What…_

As if sensing everything from the distant end of a long tunnel, Raph felt Leo and Mike grab him around the arms and drag him bodily towards the Transmat, up the stairs and onto the platform of the machine. His legs bumped uselessly on the ground; if his brothers hadn't been holding him up, he would have collapsed. "Get out, get out, get out," he panted, truly panicking now. Then his jaw snapped itself shut against his will, no longer letting him speak.

_Thank you for providing me with an escape ticket, Raphael._

Shredder's voice was loud and clear now, as if he were speaking right inside Raph's ears. His body twitched and shuddered randomly in his brothers' grip, and he could feel the vague, uncomfortable sensation of the Transmat as it began to dissolve his atoms for transportation. He thought that he was going to vomit, but for a short flash he was completely disembodied as the machine sent him wherever Don had programmed it to go. When he returned to his body he found himself falling, the alien still clinging tightly to his head, though it had shifted now to uncover his face. Unfortunately, this only meant that he could see the blur of a solid surface that was rapidly rising up to meet him. He hit, hard, and the impact made all thought and sensation cease.

**.:…:.**

… _Consolidate my control… they must not suspect… make them think the fall… I can… the nervous system, and speech centres… yes…_

The whispering inside Raph's mind was ceaseless, rising and falling with the constancy of ocean waves against the shore. _Stop it,_ he thought weakly, wishing that he could raise his hands to block his ears, block out the sound-that-wasn't-a-sound. He seemed to be floating in a black void – there was his consciousness, and the whispers, and nothing else. Was he going mad?

"Am I dead?" he tried to say, but the words were only a wisp of thought that hung trembling in the black emptiness. The whispers seemed to pause, distracted, and then a presence turned its focus to him, and he quailed under its piercing regard. There was nowhere to hide. He was flayed open and pinned down, all defences stripped away. The presence could see everything. It knew everything. It was ancient, alien, and infinitely malevolent. And it was _inside Raph's mind._

His sanity stretched, and almost broke. He thought he might be hyperventilating, except he didn't seem to have any lungs. He didn't seem to have _anything._ There was only his mind, and that was held and surrounded by the whispers. They twined through his thoughts like the roots of an old tree growing through rock – implacable, immovable. The presence seemed to know how close he was to shattering completely, for it paused in its questing and remained motionless until his mind had stabilised just enough. Eventually, it 'spoke', and this time the whispers were addressed to him.

_I am glad to see you are still with us, Raphael. It does not happen often, but the minds of some beings do snap as they are subjugated. It would have been a shame to have left you as no more than a broken toy. Particularly when you've already been so useful to me. If it were not for you, your heartless family would have left me to be destroyed in that building._

_Shredder… _ Raph's scattered thoughts finally managed to form themselves into coherent words. _What… what have you done to me?_

_There's no need to act so shocked,_ Shredder's voice drawled from the darkness. _This isn't the first time you've experienced an Utrom mind_.

Raph did not draw on it himself, but the memory of the creepy mind-meld pods and his experience in Utrom history was pushed to the front of his thoughts. _No, _he denied firmly. _That was freaky as hell, but it wasn't anything like _this._ This is…_

_Unnatural?_ Shredder finished the thought for him. _I assure you, it is perfectly natural for an Utrom. My race has become weak and pathetic, with their collective memories locked up in their pods instead of cemented by a physical link. They refuse to acknowledge it, but control is what we are biologically evolved for. We were meant to dominate this universe._

Raphael turned cold. _I don't understand._ He knew that Shredder was aware he was lying, but the alien explained further anyway, with obvious relish.

_Then let me make this perfectly clear, so that you do not waste time fighting it: your body belongs to me. Your mind belongs to me. Your memories belong to me. You will not speak or move or breathe of your own volition. I now control your every move, down to the blink of an eyelid._

_That's not possible, _Raph thought with as much certainty as he could muster, which was not much.

_Not possible?_ Raphael's mind echoed with Shredder's laughter. _Very well. I believe it's time for a demonstration._

**.:…:.**


	2. The Puppet Master

**A/n:** I have nothing to say, other than to thank you all for the reviews on the last chapter! Remember kiddies: feedback makes it fun. ;)

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**_Chapter 2 – The Puppet Master  
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Instantaneously, and somewhat painfully, Raph snapped back into a full awareness of his body, and his senses all switched on at once. His eyes burned with light and colour, and he was overwhelmed by the rush of sounds, a swirl of noise that he was too disoriented to make any sense of. Pain ran in rivers throughout his body, as if he had been slammed into a hard surface. He could feel cold, unforgiving metal against his skin and under his shell.

"Raph? Hey, Raph!" Someone was slapping his face lightly, trying to bring him around (although Raph wasn't sure that blank void he'd been in was unconsciousness, exactly). The indistinct, greeny blur inches from his eyes resolved itself into Donatello's worried face, peering closely at him, and checking the dilation of his pupils. "Hey, are you back in the land of the living? Sorry about that – I got us out, but apparently I neglected to get us _down._"

Raphael tried to nod to show Don that he was lucid, but his muscles did not obey him.

_No… I must have just jarred something in the fall, that's all, _he thought desperately. _I'll be alright in a minute._

_Watch, _came the Shredder's disembodied voice. _Watch, and learn._

"Well," said Mikey from somewhere close by, "at least it looks like our little sky-diving experience put the Shredder out for the count as well."

"He does seem to be unconscious," Don agreed thoughtfully. "Still stuck on there pretty tight, though."

"If he's knocked _out_, shouldn't he have been knocked _off_?" said Leo.

Automatically, Raph turned to face him. Except his body remained exactly where it was, motionless and staring up at the small patch of darkening New York sky that was trapped between the buildings on either side.

"Not necessarily," said Don. "There are a lot of creatures that can maintain muscle constrictions, even after death. Anacondas, for example…"

Raph couldn't see, but Don must have been on the receiving end of one of Leo's 'anti-tangent' looks, because he trailed off and then started a different sentence. "Anyway, it looks like there's some sort of natural chemical adhesive."

"Say what now?"

"_Glue_, Mikey." Don rolled his eyes. "My guess is the Shredder knew we wouldn't leave Raph in the building, so he hitched a ride as a sure way out of there." Donatello prodded at the alien's body distastefully. To his shock, Raphael felt the touch as if he were poking at his bare skin. He wanted to jerk away from the sensation, but none of his instructions seemed to be getting through from his brain to his limbs. It was incredibly frustrating.

And it was also terrifying. He could sense that the Shredder was aware of his terror, and basking in it.

_Do you believe me now, little turtle?_

"Raph?" Raphael's continued lack of response had got Don worried again. "Are you okay?"

_No,_ thought Raph as loudly as he could, shouting in his own head. _I'm not okay, I'm _really _not okay. Don, help me…_

Raphael's mouth opened, and his voice came out and painted smooth words on the air. "Yeah, yeah, m'fine. Just had the wind knocked outta me." His arms moved and lifted his body into a sitting position. Splinter, Don, Leo and Mikey were crouched around him on the roof of the Battleshell.

_I'm not fine!_ Raph wanted to scream. _If I was fine I'd be tryin' to tear this ball of slime off my head!_

_A good idea,_ the Shredder mused. Raph felt as if he'd been strung like a puppet as Shredder ordered his arms to lift up and tug at the mass of alien flesh wrapped over his skull, convincingly pretending to try and dislodge it. "What, you guys haven't got this thing off me yet?"

It was exactly what Raph _would_ have said if he'd been the one in control of his voice box, and the Shredder carried off his tone perfectly.

"I was more concerned with making sure I hadn't given you a concussion," said Don apologetically, "but Shredder's latched on pretty tight. Sorry, but I think you're stuck with your new headgear until he wakes up and we can talk him into letting you go, or until we get back to the lair and I find something in my chemical stores to dissolve this stuff." Don poked again at the edge of one tentacle.

Shredder took less than half a second to search Raph's vocabulary for an appropriate response. Raph was filled with a wave of revulsion – it was as if someone had pressed cold fingers right into his brain and stirred things around, turned things over to examine them, and then pulled out whatever it needed. His arm raised without his permission again and batted at Don's prodding fingers. "Great. Just peachy. This is disgusting. And if you make any more alien cracks, Mikey, I swear I'm gonna smack you again."

"I do not like this," Splinter said darkly, and inside the prison walls of his mind, Raph felt a surge of hope. "We must not underestimate our enemy. This utrom body is the reason why the Shredder has survived all of our attacks in the past. When he awakens, I fear we shall still have a fight on our hands."

"Aw, c'mon, Sensei!" Mikey grinned. "I could crush this guy using only one toe. He'd probably pop like the slugs in the sewers." His grin became obnoxious as he turned it on Raph. "It'd look good on you, bro. You could start a new trend. Ooze-y headgear, it'd be all the rage!"

"This is _so far_ from being funny, Mikey," growled Shredder in Raph's voice.

The words were almost drowned out by the sudden roar of a military helicopter passing by overhead, its spotlight swinging around to focus on the smoking hole that had up until a few minutes ago been the TCRI building. It reminded them that most of the New York police force were parked right outside their alley, and Leo said what everyone was thinking.

"We can't stay here." He rose to his feet and jumped down from the roof of the Battleshell, landing gracefully on the ground. The others followed him, and Raph's body moved as well to join them in the alleyway.

_Give it up, you useless slimeball!_ He raged against his mental restraints. _How long do ya think you can keep this up for? They're gonna realise something's wrong, and when they do…_

Shredder ignored him, focusing instead on the two human figures that had rounded the corner of the alley and caught sight of them. Casey and April looked at them all as if they were ghosts.

"_Guys!_ You're okay! Master Splinter – how did you guys _get_ here? God, I'm so glad you're alright, we thought…"

"_Woah._" Casey's loud exclamation of surprise cut across April's tirade. "Raph! What the hell are you wearing?"

Trapped behind his own eyes, Raph stared out at his best friend, mute and helpless. "Don't even ask," growled his voice.

"Believe me, we've got a _long_ story to tell," said Leo. "But we'll have to fill you in later, because right now we need to disappear. The streets are crawling with cops. Can you guys get the Battleshell back to the garage?"

April was practically biting through her lip to hold back her flood of questions. "Of course. As long as I get a phone call later telling me what the hell happened in there." She was eyeing the alien on Raph's head with a morbid sort of fascination. She didn't look away, even as Leo shepherded her and Casey gently towards the doors of the vehicle.

"I'll explain everything, I promise." He shot a look back over his shoulder towards Raph. "We've just got to take care of a little something first."

"Damn right," said Raph's disgruntled voice.

Raph had given up on trying to reclaim his body. Instead he threw the whole weight of his mental focus against the Shredder's barrier, trying to break through and control his voice. If only he could just say something, _anything,_ to warn his family…

Shredder's mind twisted and tightened its hold around him, burying him deeper inside his own flesh. _Be quiet,_ the alien hissed, _or I won't even allow you to watch. I could make your mind a tomb and leave you in the black void while I use your body for my purposes. Is that what you want?_

_What are you gonna do? _Raph could sense an uncertainty that wasn't his own; apparently this mind-link thing could work both ways. The Shredder had no definitive plan right now other than 'stay alive'. He would merely lie in wait and see what opportunities presented themselves.

April and Casey were in the Battleshell with the engine running, and Mikey was holding up a manhole cover while Don and Master Splinter disappeared underground. "C'mon, guys," he urged the others impatiently.

"You go first," said Leo to Raph. His eyes glinted watchfully as he stood back to let his brother pass. Shredder didn't reply, but Raph could sense his disappointment as he slipped down the manhole and into the sewers. For once, Raph was deeply grateful for Leo's paranoia. He had the feeling that if Shredder ran off with his body now, he'd never be seeing his family again.

Compared to the police circus that was going on above ground, the sewers were dim and hushed. There was a quiet clank as Leo eased the manhole cover back into place, and then he dropped down to join them. Everyone's heads swivelled to face Raphael and his unwelcome passenger.

"Uh, can we go home now so that Donnie can get this worm off me? I'm sick've everyone staring."

Mikey snickered. "Can we get a photo, first? I want to remember this."

"Enough," Splinter said firmly, with enough authority to squash Mikey's snickers, if not the grin plastered across his face. "We cannot return to the Lair now. I will not have that abomination in my home. We must destroy it."

Leonardo reached back to loosen his sword in its sheath.

"_No!_" Raph's voice echoed loudly in the stone tunnels, and Shredder unconsciously made his legs take a step backwards, bumping his shell against the wall. Raph's family looked at him strangely, and Shredder realised his error. He searched furiously through Raph's mind for something to justify his actions.

"Damnit, guys, I know it _looks_ like some creepy little slug, but this is the _Shredder_. Think of everythin' he's done. To Master Yoshi, to the Utrom – to _us._ This is too good for him. If ya kill him now then he probably won't even feel it. When we finish the slimeball, I want him ta see death comin'. I want to look him in the eye and I want him to know that he _deserves_ it." His teeth were bared and his hands were curled into fists. Raph could feel Shredder drawing on his own anger effortlessly, and it seemed to be convincing. From the dark expressions on his brothers' faces, Raph could tell that Shredder had persuaded them. And then Splinter spoke and further crushed his hopes of immediate salvation.

"Raphael is right. Our vengeance will come, but we will not strike down an unconscious enemy."

There was a dull metallic sound as something, a car or perhaps someone's footsteps, passed over the manhole above their heads. They tensed, abruptly silent. After a second, Splinter gestured tersely for his sons to follow him. Leo stayed behind Raph, his eyes boring into the back of his shell. Shredder twitched in irritation at the constant surveillance.

Splinter led them down the tunnels to a familiar run-off junction, where three passageways opened out into a large central chamber, murky water trickling in and gathering in a deep pool beneath the walkway where they stood. He held up a hand for them to stop. "We should be safe enough here while we rest and decide on our next course of action."

"We're definitely going to need some chemicals," Don mused. "The problem will be finding something that will dissolve the cementing agent without melting through Raph's skull. That glue is _tough_."

"So's Raph's skull."

"I've got a few things back at the Lair that I'd like to try…"

"Good," said the Shredder suddenly, with more enthusiasm than Raph was expecting. "Can ya hurry up and go get 'em, then?" His face creased itself into a carefully contrived expression of distaste. "The sooner this thing comes off, the better."

At Splinter's nod of assent, Don turned to depart. "Hey, Mikey, can you help me carry some stuff? I don't know exactly what we'll need, so I'll want a few options, and I don't want to have to make two trips."

Mikey heaved a long-suffering sigh. "You only ever want me for my muscles. Well, they _are_ pretty spectacular, I suppose…" His chattering quickly faded away as he and Don moved off down one of the tunnels.

_Two down_, thought the Shredder smugly, and Raphael felt suddenly cold. He could sense that the alien was planning something, but he'd shielded his thoughts and Raph didn't know what to expect.

"We must remain on our guard, my sons," Splinter cautioned them. "Raphael, have you felt our enemy stirring?"

Shredder shook Raph's head. "He hasn't moved since we left the building. I think I sorta landed on him when we fell. Heh… oops." He sounded unrepentant. "Believe me, if he starts wriggling around again I'll yell loud enough for most of Manhattan to hear."

Leo came to stand right in front of him, and put a hand on Raph's shoulder for extra balance as he stood on his toes to examine the alien closely. Shredder kept Raph's body relaxed, but inside his mind he tensed at the proximity of Leonardo and his blades.

Raphael could feel the warm weight of his brother's hand on his shoulder. At that moment he wanted to reach out to him, wanted it more than anything. He was so close, and yet so impossibly far away.

_How sweet,_ Shredder mocked him. _Is the little one missing his big brother already?_

Leo settled back on his heels and lifted his hand from Raph's shoulder. Raph felt its loss with a sharp pang, and Shredder chuckled silently.

"His eyes are still closed," said Leo. "And, uh, I don't even know if he has eyelids. And I don't know if the pupil dilation of an utrom would tell us much, anyway." He looked at his father. "I guess we just wait, and hope that Don finds something workable."

"Indeed," said Splinter grimly, as he sank down to sit on the cold stone floor. His actions seemed weary, as if his bones ached. Leo went to sit beside him, but Raph growled and turned away, walking towards the railing that overlooked the pool of water far below. His footsteps took him closer to the dark entrance of one of the passageways.

"Raphael," barked Splinter, before he could go more than a few steps. "You must not go far. We must all be ready to deal with the Shredder if he awakens."

"I'm not goin' anywhere," the Shredder said sulkily, caught in the act. "I just can't handle sittin' around right now." Raph's arms leaned against the railing as he slouched over it. He glared down into the water, thinking furiously about how to escape without being followed. While they were unaware he was in control, he still held the advantage; if only there was some way to leave without rousing their suspicion…

_They're too smart for you,_ Raph told him. _Might as well give up now and show your hand, coward._ If he'd been trying to goad him into doing something rash, then Raph was disappointed. The Shredder was too busy scheming to even pay attention to his thoughts. Raph hated being ignored, especially when it was inside his own goddamn head. After a while he turned his focus to the quiet murmurs behind him. What he overheard made him wish that Shredder would let him turn around and see his Master's face.

"Sensei, are you alright?" Leo was asking, his tone gone quiet with worry.

Master Splinter expelled a sigh. "I am fine, my son. It is simply that I am not as young as I once was, and battles such as the one we fought today take more of my energy than they used to."

Raph felt the Shredder turn those words over in his mind, an idea beginning to form. _Perhaps,_ thought Shredder to himself, _I have been overlooking some of the… possibilities… of controlling this body._

"You can rest now, Sensei. Don and Mike will be back soon, and Raph and I can keep this situation under control until then."

Shredder risked a quick backwards glance over his shoulder. Splinter was nodding, his eyes blinking closed wearily and his head tilting back to lean against the brick wall. He murmured something else to Leo, but Raph couldn't focus on it over the surge of excitement from Shredder. Leo made a move to stand up, and Shredder quickly turned to stare down unseeingly at the water again. _This is my chance - now, while the other two are gone and he is still weakened!_

_NO!_ The realisation of what Shredder was planning to do hit Raph as if a punch had just been slammed into his gut. He felt like he was unable to breathe.

Shredder schooled Raph's face to blankness as Leo came up to stand beside him, mirroring his posture by leaning on the railing.

"Is he okay?" Shredder asked in mock concern, jerking Raph's head to indicate their Sensei.

_Leo! Get back to Master Splinter! Get away from me!_

"Yeah," Leo sighed. "He's just worn out. I mean, he'd only just healed from our _last_ encounter with Shredder, thanks to the Utrom's technology. And today was pretty intense." He glanced sidelong at Raph, and then frowned and turned quickly away again. "I can't believe the Shredder's an _alien_. I guess that explains how he's been causing trouble on this planet for almost a millennium…"

"It explains a lot," Shredder said shortly, his patience dwindling. Leo opened his mouth to ask what he meant, but Shredder cut across him. "Hey, what is that?" Raph's eyes narrowed as he leaned down further, peering at something non-existent in the water below them.

_Oh, come on,_ thought Raph, _you know Leo's not dumb enough to fall for that shit._

_You might be surprised how gullible people are when they think they are speaking to somebody that they trust,_ thought Shredder.

"What?" Leo leaned over, trying to see what he was looking at.

_No, Leo, you idiot…_

"Down there." Shredder pointed Raph's finger towards the water right beneath the walkway. Leo bent over the railing even further, leaning his plastron against it.

"I don't - "

He didn't get to finish his sentence, because at that moment Shredder grabbed him by the bottom lip and the top rim of his shell, and _tilted._ With so much of his weight already overbalanced, Leo barely had time for a surprised gasp as his body tipped clear over the railing. Shredder didn't watch him fall, because he was already moving.

Inside his mind, Raphael was screaming.

He was two steps away from Splinter when Leo's body hit the water with an enormous splash, and the rat's eyes flew open with the realisation that something was wrong. Shredder covered the remaining distance with a flying crash tackle, knowing that he would only have this one chance to finish things. His momentum sent them both tumbling across the floor, landing in the middle of the walkway. Shredder fought to ensure that Raph's heavier body ended up on top. The shock of the random attack slowed Splinter's reflexes just enough, and by the time he had begun to fight back in earnest, Shredder already had him pinned under Raphael's considerable weight, with both large hands wrapped around his throat. Raph could feel the familiar softness of his Sensei's fur beneath his palms.

Shredder squeezed, cutting off his air.

_Stop! NO, stop it! Master Splinter!_ Raph blasted against Shredder's mind with every bit of mental strength he could muster, frantically trying to claw his way through, to prise open the crushing grip of his own hands. His efforts were about as effective as raindrops on stone.

_No, no, no…_ the horrified litany pounded through his head as he watched himself strangle his father. He could feel every shift of his own muscles as Shredder expertly held down the struggling body beneath him. Splinter ceased his ineffectual blows against Raphael's solid bulk, and his hands flew instead to his own throat, trying to break Raphael's grip. Shredder snarled grimly and stared straight into Splinter's eyes.

For the rest of his life, Raphael would never forget what he saw there.

_Oh God, it's happening so fast…_

An enormously loud clanging sound came from beside him. Splinter had managed to grab his walking stick from where it had fallen, and he had reached out to drag the end of it against the metal bars of the railing, trying to draw attention to their silent struggle. Raph thought he could hear shouting, but all the noise seemed to blend into the dull and growing roar in his ears. Shredder pressed his knee more firmly into Splinter's chest, determined to finish it, and Raph felt something give sickeningly beneath him. He was drowning in his father's fading eyes.

Something slammed into him solidly from the side, sending him sprawling on the floor. Shredder wrestled wildly with the figure on top of him, snarling furiously through Raph's mouth like an animal.

"LEO!" Mikey bellowed deafeningly, as he did his best to hold Raph down and dodge the blows that were raining upon him. "_DON_!"

Shredder landed a powerful punch to Mikey's jaw that sent him twisting through the air, and then he stumbled to his feet to make his escape. But he wasn't quick enough; somehow Leo had managed to scale the wall back up to the walkway, and before Shredder could react he had one of Raph's arms twisted up and locked behind his back. Even then the Shredder risked a break by trying to buck him off, and it almost worked – but then Mikey was there and clinging grimly to Raphael's other arm.

There was the sound of glass shattering as Don arrived and promptly dropped the box of whatever he'd been carrying, flinging himself to his knees beside Master Splinter, who was gasping and coughing roughly, trying to regain his breath.

Shredder continued to struggle for a few fruitless seconds, even as Leonardo was yelling in his face. "Raphael, _get a grip!_ What the _hell_ is wrong with you?"

Once he realised that Leo and Mike were restraining him securely, the Shredder ceased to fight and let Raph's body go limp in their grip. He was panting lightly. Soon he began to laugh under his breath.

_You're fucking insane,_ Raph thought dazedly, his mind still reeling.

"Sensei, just stay still. Don't try to speak."

Splinter batted weakly at Don's fluttering hands as he raised himself to a sitting position. The pain of the movement was apparent on his face. He fixed Raphael with his gaze, and Shredder stared back, defiant, still laughing in Raph's voice.

"Not…" Splinter wheezed, and then had to stop to cough and swallow, forcing his abused throat to work. He tried again. "Not… Raphael."

Raph could sense the rest of his family turning to look at him, and he could feel their horror as they began to understand. But Shredder did not look away from Splinter's face. He twisted Raphael's mouth into a vicious smile.

"Forgive me, father," he intoned with low irony, "for I have sinned."

Splinter looked into his son's familiar eyes, and saw a stranger staring back at him.

**.:…:.**


	3. Confusion

_**Chapter 3 – Confusion**_

**.:…:.**

"Um, okay, can someone please tell me what the _shell_ is going on?"

"Don't let go of him, Mikey," Leo warned, his own muscles still bulging with his grip on Raph's arm.

Don stayed where he was on the floor, all of his focus on his injured father. Splinter looked like he was still trying to speak, but the breath he drew in caused him to make a small sound of pain, and he sagged back against Donatello, his eyes closing tightly.

Don's hands came up to inspect his chest, fingers feeling gently through the fur. His eyes were still wide with shock behind his mask, but his voice was steady when he spoke. "I think you've broken some ribs. Please try not to move, and keep your breathing under control."

Splinter didn't seem to like those orders, but he complied. When Don was sure he wasn't in immediate danger of injuring himself further, he risked a glance up at his brothers. Raphael still had that mad, unnatural grin on his face. Don knew that he should be furious, but at that moment all he could feel was a deep, irrational fear. This didn't seem like an ordinary case of Raph losing his temper. He'd never seen his brother smiling like that before. All of his senses were telling him that something was seriously wrong.

Before his eyes, the smile on Raphael's face disappeared with jarring abruptness.

"Guys, you can let go of me. I'm… I'm under control. Oh god, Sensei… I'm so sorry…" He sounded broken.

Splinter shook his head, and pointed at Raphael again, the simple effort making his face crease in pain. Leo and Mikey showed no sign of releasing their hold. The clinically observant part of Don's brain noted that there was a puddle of water at Leo's feet, and his skin was still dripping.

"He jumped me," Leo said tersely. "Splinter's right. This is _not_ Raphael."

"C'mon, guys, let me go."

"What do you mean, 'this isn't Raph'?" Mikey asked, frustrated at the lack of answers he was receiving.

"Yeah, who else would I be?"

If Don had hackles, he would have raised them. The voice was Raph's but it wasn't. The tone was just slightly off, the eyes too wide.

In one fluid motion, Leo drew a katana from its sheath and slammed the hilt of it in between two of Shredder's tentacles and into Raph's temple, using a precise amount of force.

Raph's knees buckled and he slid smoothly to the ground.

"_Leo!_" Mike had half gone down with him, not prepared for the extra weight of an unconscious brother.

Don felt Splinter relax slightly under his hands. "Please tell me you had a good reason to do that," he said to Leo, half-knowing and dreading the truth.

"He's still dangerous. I think the Shredder is influencing him somehow." His eyes flicked to Splinter, and their Sensei nodded wordlessly, his face grim.

"Influencing him? How?" Mikey peered down at his fallen brother in alarm.

Don recognised his cue. He rested a hand on Splinter's shoulder, hoping that he'd remember the instruction to stay still, and then he rose and went to crouch down next to Mikey, beside Raph's still form. He didn't know what he was looking for. The alien body which had latched onto Raph's head seemed to have flattened and shaped itself around the dome of the skull, a streamlined and grotesque layer of flesh. The Shredder's eyes were closed and sunk deeply into the folds of his body. His appearance made some memory niggle in the back of Don's mind, but he couldn't quite place it. He put his hands on either side of Raph's face and tilted it towards himself, checking underneath his brother's eyelids.

"He's out of it," he said quietly. "And the Shredder still seems unresponsive too. Leo, are you sure? I mean, I'm not doubting your judgement or anything, but… well, this wouldn't be the first time that Raph's lost his temper. Did you, uh… _say_ anything that would set him off like that?"

"No! We weren't even arguing. You guys didn't see him. He wasn't angry. He was… cold. He knew what he was doing." Leo went to kneel beside his father, and his next words were directed at him. "I'm sorry. He took me by surprise."

"What are we gonna do?" asked Mikey in a small voice.

"If Leo's right, then I think we'll have to get him back to the Lair. We'll need to restrain him until I can find a way to free him, and we need to do it before he wakes up," Don thought aloud. "If we can get Raph inside while the Shredder is still unconscious, or whatever he is, then he won't know the location of the Lair or how to get through the entrance. And it's the most secure place we have to hold him. The _only_ secure place, really."

Leo was nodding reluctantly. "You're right. We can't keep him here." He put his arm behind Splinter's shoulders. "You guys take Raph. I'll carry Master Splinter."

**.:…:.**

It was a fairly long walk to the Lair, especially burdened as they were. They remained silent and tense. The only sounds were the soft splash or pad of their footsteps, and the glass vials clinking together in Don's duffel bag. Before they left the run-off junction he'd collected the unbroken bottles from the pile of smashed glass where he'd dropped the box of chemicals he'd been carrying to rush to Splinter's side. He just hoped that one of them would work to counteract whatever the Shredder had used on Raphael. He didn't exactly understand what Leo had meant when he said he thought the Shredder was 'influencing' Raph. He had a feeling it was one of those un-scientific things that he'd prefer not to know about. He'd question Raph when he woke up. Maybe he'd just knocked his head too hard when they fell out of their last Transmat journey. He _had_ seemed pretty groggy when they landed.

Don tried to convince himself that a few too many bumps to the head was Raph's only problem – nothing worse than confusion brought on by a mild concussion.

Another part of his brain was reminding him that questioning Raph about his mental health while he was locked up in his own home was not going to be a fun, happy experience for anyone involved.

_But if it's a choice between restraining him and watching him go after Master Splinter again…_ His hold on his unconscious brother tightened. _I can't let that happen. And Raph wouldn't _want _me to let that happen, even if he does bitch and moan about being chained up._

They all knew how to slip knots far too easily. Until they could figure out what was going on with Raph, it would have to be heavy duty stuff.

With their hands full, they got the door of the lair open with some difficulty. It seemed like whole lifetimes ago since they had left it on their mission to infiltrate the TCRI building. Technically, it had only been about half a day, but because of the way the Transmat distorted time, it had been almost three weeks for Don and his brothers.

_This is _not_ how I hoped we'd be arriving back home,_ Don thought morosely. At least they'd managed to find Splinter in the TCRI building. Leo was ahead of him, carrying Splinter across the living room on his way to Don's lab. It was strange to hear the unsteadiness in his Sensei's breathing. Don could tell by the quality of it that his broken ribs were causing him a considerable amount of pain. Before he could do anything about that, however, they had Raph to deal with.

"Into the dojo," he huffed to Mikey.

"Are you sure? All those weapons…"

"He won't be able to reach them. And I don't like the idea of Shredder being anywhere else in our home."

"Yeah, I guess. No one's gonna want to sit next to him at the breakfast table, that's for sure."

Don could tell that his younger brother was using humour to mask his sense of unease. Having the Shredder right here in the Lair, in their secret home – even if he _was_ currently unconscious – was disturbing to Don, too. _There's no other choice,_ he told himself firmly, as they entered and set Raph's bulk down beside the wall of the dojo, where a set of thick pipes made their way from floor to ceiling.

"See if you can find some spare lengths of chain, will you? There should be some in the crates over there. I'll grab a padlock from my lab." He was out the door before his brother could reply.

Mikey gulped. "Sure. No worries," he told the silent dojo. _What if Raph wakes up and goes all psycho on me?_

He pulled out the chains from their storage amongst their spare training materials and odds and ends, as much as he could find, and brought it all over to Raph's still body. He watched him warily. He was so on edge that he actually jumped and spun around when he sensed someone else entering the dojo. It was Leo, with a large padlock and key in hand.

"Don's tending to Master Splinter," he said in answer to Mikey's questioning look. "He says that Sensei's going to be okay, he just needs rest. He's worried about his ribs, though." He came to kneel down beside Raph, pulling his unconscious brother upright and leaning the side of his shell against the wall. "Warn me if he starts to wake up."

He selected the longest piece of chain and drew Raph's wrists together behind his back, trying to be gentle. He wound the chain around the wrists, wrapping them firmly, but careful not to restrict the circulation. Mikey could see the conflict flickering across Leo's face, and he felt the same way. Every instinct screamed at him that it was wrong to watch his brother be chained, and not jump in to help him. A lifetime of warrior instincts meant that none of them liked being bound, but Raph always took it the worst. The loss of control frightened him. Mikey found that out the hard way, after he'd used almost two dozen packets of cling wrap on a drunkenly sleeping Raph and wrapped him in a cocoon of plastic in his hammock. Mikey had paid for that one for weeks afterwards. He'd known that Raph would be mad – that was kinda the point – but he'd underestimated the reaction that he would get.

"This is so wrong," he muttered, just because he felt that _someone_ should say it out loud.

Leo wound the ends of the chains around the pipes on the wall, and then clicked the padlock shut over them. He sat back, leaving Raph to lean with his shell against the wall, his arms securely bound behind him.

"I know," said Leo in a low voice, not able to look at either of them.

"He's gonna be okay though, right?" Mikey asked with a hint of desperation. "I mean, it's not like Raph completely snapped and now he's insane or evil or anything. This is just a precaution! He'll probably wake up and be straight back to his usual grouchy self."

Leo tried to smile at him. "Let's hope so."

Mikey wasn't reassured. He turned his gaze back to Raph and crept closer to him, feeling safer now that his brother was restrained. He felt guilty about that, but Raph could be pretty scary when he was mad. Mikey wished he could bleach the image from his memory – Raph with his hands around Splinter's throat, leaning over him, a weird glint in his eyes… he shook his head slightly to dislodge the mental picture, and then he reached out, slowly, towards the Shredder's alien body.

"Don't!" snapped Leo, but he was too late. Mikey's finger was already prodding at the tentacle in the centre of Raph's forehead. It wasn't as squishy as he'd expected, and it was kind of cold to the touch.

"_Gross_," he said to himself, peering at the Shredder's closed eye slits. "I still can't believe our arch-nemesis is an alien blob! And why did he wanna stick to Raph, anyway? Raph! Of all people!"

Leo opened his mouth, probably to tell him off, but at that moment a quiet groan escaped from Raph and his head wobbled unsteadily upwards. Mikey gave a yelp of surprise and fell backwards, landing on his ass.

Raph opened his eyes and blinked a few times, trying to focus on his brother. When he finally found his voice, it seemed more quizzical than angry.

"Mikey… what the hell just happened?"

**.:…:.**


	4. Complications

**A/n: **Before we get any further in, I should take this chance to acknowledge the debt this story owes to the _Animorphs_ series. Yes, one reviewer has spotted it already, but some aspects of the plot were certainly inspired by the Yeerks. If you're reading this and thinking, "what the hell is a 'Yeerk'?", then don't worry, you don't need to know! But if you were wondering, then yes… I read a lot of Animorphs books as a kid. ;)

As always, thank you for your reviews! And let me know if anything in the writing needs more work – I need constant practice and polishing!

* * *

**Chapter 4 - Complications**

**.:…:.**

It was Leo who answered Raph's question, with another one of his own. "What do you mean, 'what happened'? You don't remember?"

Raph frowned, tugging unconsciously at his bindings. "I don't… I, I think… I was mad about something?" His eyes widened in abrupt panic and fixed themselves upon Leo's face. "Did I hurt someone? Where's Don?"

"Don's fine. You tried to kill Master Splinter." Leo's voice was like ice, and Raph crumbled.

"_No…_ Sensei… is he -?"

"He's going to be alright," came Don's voice from the entrance to the dojo, "but broken ribs take a long time to heal in a patient of that age. His bones are more brittle than they used to be. And even when they mend themselves, they'll probably always be fragile. He'll have to be careful. He can barely talk at the moment, either, but the worst of the bruising should start to go down in a couple of days." Don came to kneel on the mats next to Leo and Mikey, several small glass bottles clasped absently in his hands. He was watching Raphael curiously.

"Master Splinter…" Raph twisted forward desperately. "I… I gotta see him! Please, guys, let me go. I'm _sorry_, I'm so sorry. You have to let me see him!"

"I don't think so," Leo said carefully. "Not until we figure out what's going on with you. You were acting pretty weird back there, Raph. And in case you haven't noticed, you've still got an evil alien life form setting up camp on top of your skull."

"I don't care about that right now! Guys, come on. It's not like I haven't lost control before. But I – I'm safe now, I swear I am. You don't need ta chain me up like this."

Don considered him. "He definitely _sounds_ like himself again."

Mikey was shifting uncomfortably, and Raph seemed to notice, for he focused his efforts on him. "Mikey, you _know_ me. You know I don't mean it when I lose control, you know I fuckin' _hate_ it. Just let me go so I can start beggin' him to forgive me, already. Goddamnit!" He lunged forward and the chains rattled noisily.

Mikey shrank back from him, his uncertainty hardening to determination. "You've been awake for all of two minutes, bro. I don't think we can assume that you've got all your marbles together just yet."

Raph's face transformed itself into a familiar sneer. "Oh, that's right, you've gotta suck up to Big Brother. Can't even think for yourself, can you Mike? You've always gotta tag along with whatever _Leo_ wants to do. You're pathetic, you know that? You can't even – "

"That's _enough_!" Leo snapped, aware of the hurt mixed in with Mikey's stunned expression. He stood abruptly, and in one fluid motion there was a katana in his hand. "I don't know exactly what your problem is, Raph, but I'm pretty sure the Shredder has something to do with it." His grip on his sword tightened. "Don, I don't think we have time to do this gently. Let's try my way first."

"Whoa, hang on," said Raph, "you are _not_ waving your blade around near my head. I thought we agreed! We can't just finish the Shredder like this, like it's nothing. It ain't right!"

"You know, bro, you're starting to sound like you're trying to _protect_ him." Mikey squinted at Raph thoughtfully. "That's a little weird, don't you think?"

Leo had been watching Raph's face with the unblinking intensity of a predator, and at that moment he saw it again. Raph hesitated just a fraction of a second too long in forming a response to Mikey's question, and Leo saw something utterly unfamiliar in his eyes, a fleeting expression that should not have been there.

Leo's own eyes narrowed. "We've put this off for long enough. We may not be able to give the Shredder the death he deserves, but I won't allow this abomination to live any longer. It's time to end it." He drew back his arm, carefully aiming the trajectory of his blade to pass just above Raph's head, intending to sever the alien's tentacles from its body. His muscles coiled, ready to release the killing blow.

The katana fell.

"_Stop._"

Raphael said the single word so strangely that Leo could do nothing but obey, his sword freezing only a hair's breadth from the side of the Shredder's body. No one moved.

"If you kill me, you will destroy your brother as well," said Raph.

A heartbeat.

"What exactly do you mean by that?" Leo's voice had gone deadly soft.

"You mean you still haven't guessed?" Raph's eyes glinted strangely, ignoring the sword that still hovered beside his head. "Well, perhaps you'd be lucky. Perhaps your brother _would_ survive my death. It has happened before, but rarely. Of course, his mind would still be obliterated. Kill me, and he would flicker out as quickly and quietly as a candle flame dying."

"Splinter was right," Leo hissed, his sword unmoving. "You're not Raphael."

"No," Raph bared his teeth in a smile. "I am not Raphael."

"That's _not funny_, Raph," Mikey wobbled in a sick voice. Don remained frozen in horror beside him.

"I think it is, actually. Personally I find it quite amusing." There was no trace of a Brooklyn accent left in the words. The intonation was all wrong.

"_Shredder_." Leo growled the name like it was a curse, and Raphael's smile grew even wider.

"You've finally figured it out," the Shredder mocked him in Raph's voice. "You call yourselves his family, and you can't even tell when he's become a prisoner in his own body. How very disappointing."

"How is this possible?" croaked Don, his eyes wide. "What have you _done_?"

"I see that you'll take some convincing, Donatello." Raph had ceased to tug at his bindings, and he sat there now perfectly calm and in control. "Believe me, there is a completely rational explanation for my current control of your brother. And what I said before was true; if you try to remove me you _will_ damage him irreparably, probably kill him."

Leo finally lowered his sword, but he still did not return it to its sheath. "Why should we believe you?"

"I speak the truth. Would you gamble with your brother's life in order to test me?"

Leo glared at him, undecided.

"Wait," said Don, the word tripping out of his mouth in its hurry. He reached up to grasp Leo's sword arm, restraining him, but neither of them looked away from Raph. "I don't understand. What is going on here?"

Shredder nodded Raphael's head gracefully. "Allow me to explain the situation to you. The Utrom are capable of secreting a gel-like chemical called – well, there is no way to say it in your language, and if there were it would not mean anything to you. It does not occur naturally in any other life form and it cannot be synthesised by the technology on this pitiful planet. The Utrom secrete the chemical over the area of the brain in our chosen host, where it hardens to a substance far tougher than any found on Earth. This both binds us to the victim and allows us to transmit neurological signals through it to the brain." He paused to consider his schoolroom summary, and seemed to find it satisfactory. "Questions? Comments?"

"So you're a parasite," said Don, sounding like he might be ill. And then something else occurred to him. "The pods, in the Utrom memory chamber – the headpieces were the same shape. Like… like tentacles. _That's_ why this looked so familiar to me."

Leo had adjusted his glare upwards to focus it on the alien squatting on his brother's head, even though the Shredder's eyes were closed, and the voice he was using was Raph's. "So it was _you_ who tried to kill Master Splinter."

"Perhaps. Perhaps there is also a seed of anger in your brother, born of resentment and jealousy and hatred and violence. Part of him enjoyed it. Oh yes, he was there," Shredder said to them. "He felt every moment of the struggle. And the darkness in him rejoiced. He's here with us right now – kicking up quite a fuss, actually, I can tell you."

"_Shut up_," hissed Mikey, lunging forward but stopping just short of laying his hands on Raph. "My brother isn't like that. You don't know anything about him!"

"Of course, you couldn't let yourself believe that, could you? You, Michelangelo, have been on the receiving end of that darkness before. You've been the one that he wanted to hurt. I remember it well."

"What? How… How do you know…?"

"I'm on the inside," Shredder explained himself patiently. "I know it all. Everything your brother has thought or felt – those memories are now mine."

"Leo," said Don in a strained voice, "he knows the way to the Lair. He could lead the Foot right to us."

Leo felt as if bombshells were dropping continuously all around him. He retained his composure, barely. "Release my brother," he ordered the Shredder. "Now."

"No, I don't think so," said Shredder mildly. "You would kill me as soon as I released his body. We all know it, so let's not pretend otherwise. I know you will not let me live. It's rather ironic," he noted with a distracted tone in Raph's voice. "Your desire for vengeance has effectively meant the end of your brother's freedom."

In less than half a second, the point of Leo's katana was again hovering millimetres from the Shredder's flesh. "_Let him go_," he ground out. "I won't say it again."

Raph's body remained cautiously still. "Go ahead," he said quietly. "Murder your brother. Have your revenge on me. It's what he'd want you to do. He wouldn't mind dying for the cause, would he? I'm sure he'd understand your choice. Some things are more important than a single life." He caught Leo's eyes with Raph's own, daring him.

After a few frozen seconds Leo pulled his katana back abruptly, making a soft noise of frustration – or perhaps it was revulsion. "No. I won't do that." He took a couple of steps back, not quite trusting himself to refrain from attacking his enemy in a fit of Raph-like rage.

"A good decision," Shredder approved. "I'm sure that with a little time we can negotiate a satisfactory solution to this situation we find ourselves in."

Leo seemed to have reached his limit, for he didn't even acknowledge the Shredder's words. His jaw was clenched. "Don. Mikey. Kitchen. _Now_."

Don rose to his feet immediately, obeying the order in Leo's voice, but Mikey was still staring with a transfixed sort of horror at his chained brother. Leo reached down and yanked him up by one arm, ignoring the way his feet stumbled underneath him. Without saying another word, Leo marched them both out of the dojo. He didn't look back.

**.:…:.**

_Well_, thought the Shredder, _I thought that went fairly well, don't you?_

_You're disgusting_, seethed Raph. _I wish Leo'd taken your advice and just stabbed you in your slimy face. I don't care what woulda happened to me, it'd be worth it to shut you up._

_How fortunate for you that your brother _does_ care enough not to sacrifice your life._

_I wouldn't be feelin' so sure of yourself, Shred-head. I know Leo, and I know he'll find some way to stick it to ya._

_Yes,_ the Shredder mused, _you know your brother better than one might expect, considering your history. And because _you_ know Leonardo, so do I; and I know that he would not risk harm coming to you, not even when he has a chance to finally vanquish his enemy. Such weakness for a leader. It is a pity, you know. He could have been great, if it were not for his misguided loyalty to this 'family'._

_What would you know about it?_ snarled Raph. _Hell, you wouldn't recognise emotions or normal human interaction if it hit ya over the head!_

_Would you?_ Shredder purred. _Have you some hitherto unrevealed experience with 'human' relationships locked up in your brain? Hmm, I think not._

Raph's body shifted, the chains clanking softly. Inside his mind Raph tensed, worried that the Shredder was going to try and make a bid for freedom now that they were alone in the room. But he was merely testing the chains to see if they would hold, and Raph's body soon settled back into a sitting position against the wall.

Shredder didn't seem to be disappointed. He didn't even seem worried.

_You _should _be worried,_ Raph responded to the unspoken thought. _Ya can't hide in my head forever._

_There is time enough for me to gain the upper hand._

_Oh, sure. Cause my brother's haven't kicked yer ass half a dozen times _before _this_.

He could sense the Shredder's amusement. _Do you really believe that you have been anything other than a mild annoyance to me? I, who have lived for centuries and conquered planets and crossed galaxies? Little turtle, you have no idea who you are dealing with._

_Same old egomaniac-Shredder, _Raph tried to sound certain of himself. _A little weirder and a few more tentacles, sure. But you ain't so impressive._

_Ah, of course. 'The Shredder'. One of my many aliases on this planet. You think that Oroku Saki is my disguise. You believe you are so clever, that you have it all figured out. _He chuckled. _How little you understand. The Shredder is a role I play just as I play Oroku Saki. You cannot even conceive of who I truly am._

_A lunatic? _Raph hazarded a guess.

_You will learn, puny child,_ Shredder thought with an infinite, ancient patience. _My name is Ch'rell. And you shall come to fear me, as you should._

**.:…:.**


	5. Invisible Prison

**Chapter 5 – _Invisible Prison_**

**.:…:.**

Leo swept Don and Mikey into the kitchen in a wave of restrained anger. When he gripped the back of a chair to spin it around, his knuckles were white, and Don half expected the wood to splinter under his grasp. He turned the chair away from the table so that it was facing across the TV room to the entrance of the dojo. Apparently he didn't trust the Shredder not to abandon Raph and attempt to scuttle out of the Lair on his own tentacles.

Mikey pulled up a chair next to Leo, but his questions were directed at Don. "Okay, is this even possible? Is the Shredder really just… pulling all the strings inside Raph's head?" His eyes pleaded for an answer that Don couldn't give.

"I don't know much about Utrom biology," he said reluctantly, "but the way the Shredder explained it… I'm afraid it's at least theoretically possible. The Utrom are so advanced, and there's still so much that we don't know about them…"

Leonardo let out a soft growl, his hands curling into fists. "How many times do we have to _kill_ him? How many times is he going to come back to put this family in danger? Now Raph is - " his jaws clamped shut abruptly, unable to finish that particular sentence. "Don – do you think it's true, what he threatened? Could we really put Raph in danger if we try to get rid of the Shredder by force?"

Don sank down into a chair next to his brothers. Here was another question he really didn't want to answer. "If what he said is true, and he has formed some sort of neurological link with Raph's mind, then it would make sense. I don't see how we could do anything to one brain without effecting the one connected to it as well."

"So you don't think he's just bluffing," Mikey concluded glumly.

"I'm just guessing here, but… I don't think so," said Don. "And even if he were, the risk is too high to call him on it. If only I had some way of contacting Mr. Mortu… but the Utrom are probably halfway across the universe by now."

"Well then… what are we gonna do?"

Leo sighed. "We need Master Splinter for this. I'll talk to him in the morning, after he's had some time to recover. We can't make a decision without him – and to be honest, I don't even know what our options are here."

"It happened so fast," Don muttered. "I should have realised. Raph was yelling, just before we got out of the building. Remember? But then he stopped telling us to 'get it off', and he started yelling - "

" – _Get out_," Mikey whispered, looking appalled.

Don nodded. "At the time, I just thought he was telling us to get out of the building. But… maybe he was actually yelling at Shredder. Maybe he could feel it happening." He stopped speaking, and a shudder came over him.

"Raph must be going crazy in there," said Mikey softly. "If… if he's even still in there." He bit his lip.

Leo looked away from the dojo entrance for just a moment in order to examine Mikey's face. "What do you mean?"

Mike shook his head. "Nah. It's just – I'm just being paranoid, that's all. It's nothing."

"The_ Shredder_ is chained up in our dojo. I think a little paranoia is a prudent thing for us all. But what did you mean, 'if he's still in there'?"

Mikey slid down further in his chair, a picture of misery. "Well, we're assuming that Shredder's telling the truth about Raph still seeing and hearing everything. But… if Shredder's in Raph's head, then where's _Raph_? What if… what if he's already _gone_, and Shredder's just pretending he's still in there so he has some leverage over us?"

Leo looked as if he wished very badly that he hadn't asked. "No. No, he must still be alive. Shredder _talks_ like him, he knows things only Raph could know. He'll be alright, Mikey. But maybe we can… check." He glanced at Don. "Do you think I'd be able to find Raph's presence on the astral plane, even though the Shredder's controlling him?"

Don shrugged helplessly. "You know more about the astral plane than I do. But the link the Shredder described sounded purely biological, not metaphysical. So I guess… if he's there, you should be able to sense him."

"And if he's not?" asked Mikey, his face grim.

"He'll be there," Leo promised, "or Shredder will wish he hadn't made it out of the TCRI building."

**.:…:.**

Shredder looked surprised to see them back in the dojo so soon, and a little wary of the hard expression on Leonardo's face. He opened Raph's mouth, but Leo cut him off before he could say anything.

"Before we listen to another word from you, I want assurances that my brother is still alive."

Shredder shrugged Raph's shoulders. "You see him living and breathing before you. Obviously he has not come to any harm. He is merely… incapacitated, for the moment."

"You know that's not what I mean. How do we know you're really holding him hostage in there? Why should we believe anything you tell us?"

"I could let you speak with him, so he can tell you for himself the truth of what I say."

"That's not good enough either," said Don. "How would we know it was really Raph speaking? We've already seen that you're dishonest enough to speak with our brother's voice and pretend to be genuine."

The Shredder bristled in a very Raph-like way. "If you think that I will put myself in a compromised position and release Raphael completely in order for the four of you to exchange idle chit-chat, then you are sadly mistaken," he hissed, baring Raph's teeth at them.

"If you want to have any chance of negotiation, then I need to be certain that Raphael is still in there. I didn't expect you to have the decency to let us speak to him without interference. I'm going to reach for him on the astral plane. I'm only telling you this so I can warn you not to get in my way. If you do, then we'll assume that you're trying to hide something, and we will deal with you accordingly." Leo's voice was flat, all trace of the worried brother from the kitchen successfully buried. He wasn't going to give the Shredder any more ammunition.

Shredder considered for a moment, then nodded. "Those terms are acceptable. You may proceed."

"We weren't exactly asking _permission_," Mikey muttered under his breath, but Leo cut him off with a glare. _Don't let him bait you_, he warned his brother with his eyes. Mikey huffed, but joined Don in lighting a circle of candles on the mat around Leonardo.

Leo was still examining the Shredder closely, suspicious of his sudden cooperation. But Raph's golden eyes gazed patiently back at him, and so he settled himself on the mat in front of his brother. Don and Mikey went to sit quietly against the far wall – out of the way, but close enough to intercede if anything went wrong.

Leo focused his breathing and closed his eyes, sinking into himself. With his enemy sitting barely more than an arm's length in front of him, he had to use every ounce of the discipline accumulated over a lifetime in order to calm his mind, but eventually the world narrowed to his heartbeat and the pulses of energy around him. When he was steady, he quested outwards, seeking his brother.

The thing that met his senses almost made him recoil.

Two minds where there should have been one. Two minds hopelessly entangled, one with strangling tendrils of thought wrapped around the other, like a fat spider with a fly in its web.

Leo forgot to be relieved that Raphael's presence was there, and not wiped out of existence as they had begun to fear. This was almost worse. Every sense that he possessed slammed into him with primal, instinctive revulsion.

In this strange internal space, the Shredder was watching Leo from his position curled around Raph's mind. He wasn't being intrusive; he was merely observing, secure in his own power. Leo crept his consciousness closer, trying to brush aside the Shredder's mental barriers so that he could get to his brother.

_Raphael_, he called. He could sense that Raph was aware of him, and wanted to speak, but the Shredder held his mind paralysed and silent. No matter how close Leo drew, he couldn't quite connect. A wave of desperation and fear washed through him. It took him by surprise, because the feelings didn't come from him. They were Raph's.

Again he tried to reach out, to reassure him, but the Shredder was everywhere. He was the invisible prison walls that let him look in but kept him outside. _Get out of my way,_ he snarled. _You gave your word not to interfere._

_This is not interfering, you fool. This is the bond, _came Shredder's voice inside his head, _and I told you I would not release it. You have seen that your brother's consciousness still lives. Be content with that._ He gave a mental _shove_, and Leo's mind was slammed back into his body, making him rock backwards on the mat. Don and Mikey were quickly beside him. He blinked his eyes a few times to focus. Just in front of him, Raph was doing the same thing, a lingering expression of irritation on his face.

"You're going to regret this," Leo said softly to the Shredder, a promise in his voice.

"We'll see."

Leo turned away to answer his brothers' anxious questions.

"- you okay?" Mikey was saying. Don's hand was lingering on his shoulder. "Did the Shredder do anything? Could you find Raph?"

He held his hands up to reassure them, staunchly ignoring the fact that they were shaking. He got to his feet. "He was telling the truth. Raph is still in there. His mind is just… restrained."

"I _did_ explain this to you before," the Shredder said petulantly. "Perhaps you'll believe me in the future."

"You're not exactly a trustworthy source," Don shot back at him.

"Why would I need to lie when the truth works so well in my favour?"

Don took a step forward, but Leo's hand on his arm restrained him. "Enough, Don. There's nothing more we can do here, for the moment." He couldn't keep his exhaustion from creeping into his voice. To his relief, Don turned after a moment and walked away, his shoulders stiff. Mikey went after him. "Come on," he said, and the three of them retreated towards the kitchen once more. In the doorway, Leo stopped to look back at Raph across the dojo. He turned off the light and then left, shutting the door and leaving Raphael in darkness.

**.:…:.**

It was late, but Raph was far from sleep. He didn't think he'd ever sleep again.

Ch'rell leaned back to rest his shell against the wall. For a minute or two he tried to listen for the muffled conversation on the other side of the door, but the voices were too quiet to make out the words. Raph felt him turn his attention inward again.

_Your brother is a suspicious one, isn't he? Still, I am sure I can make him see reason. We can begin the negotiations in the morning._

Raph didn't reply. He had nothing to say, no more taunts or bravado to give.

_They will be forced to release me, in the end. There is no other way._

Raphael remained silent, and Ch'rell sulked. _Ignoring me really doesn't work, you know. I can sense everything you feel, whether you form the words or not. You are transparent to me. So why not speak? It's more entertaining that way._

He paused, waiting for a reaction from Raph. When none was forthcoming, his mind stabbed deeper into Raph's own. _Allow me, then. You are afraid and ashamed of what I have caused you to do. Even though you are trying to deny it from yourself, you already fear that you will not escape me. And yet you still hold on to the misguided hope that your family will find a solution._ He sneered. _You honestly must believe that I am an amateur. Unfortunately for _you, _turtle, I have done this many times before, and I have learned patience through the long centuries of my lifetime. It is not enough to merely be a powerful fighter; one does not survive long in my line of business without being a consummate manipulator, also. And now I am in a prime position to do what I do best. Really, you should consider it a privilege to watch me at work._

_I'll pass on that, thanks,_ Raph thought sourly, finally giving up on the silent treatment as a lost cause. It didn't seem to be shutting Ch'rell up – in fact, he seemed to love the sound of his own voice. If Raph had to listen to him, he might as well try and get some useful information out of him. _What exactly do ya mean, 'you've done this before'? You'd think someone woulda noticed people walking around with alien blobs attached to their head._

_Where do you think Oroku Saki came from? _Ch'rell asked.

Raph was silent again, but this time out of surprise. He hadn't really thought about it.

_Of course it is possible with the technology I possess to create a techno-organic body from scratch, _Ch'rell elaborated, _but it really is much simpler to genetically map an already existing body onto the basic robotic prototype._

_Wait, hold up,_ Raph sputtered. _You're telling me that Saki was just some average guy you picked up off the street so you could steal his DNA?_

_Not _just_ DNA. The original Mr. Oroku Saki was a successful but unassuming businessman who arrived in New York many years ago, not long after I brought the Foot to this city. We had been watching him for quite some time to judge whether he would be a suitable target. He was perfect for my purposes; after all, who wants to learn the workings of the U.S. stock market from scratch? I could pick it all out of his brain, and then take over his life when I was done. He had excellent business knowledge, high-level contacts, a family that was easy to get rid of…_

_You killed them,_ thought Raph, feeling sick but unsurprised.

_That would have garnered far too much attention. No, it wasn't necessary. He had a wife from a poor family and a young daughter still living in Japan. He had been saving money for almost a year in order to bring them both to New York, when I caught up with him._

It was late afternoon, and the light coming through the small window was a dirty gold. The transition was so sudden and so complete that Raphael didn't have time to be shocked. He was standing in a tiny but immaculately neat apartment. A briefcase was leaning up against the side of the bed. On the floor next to it was a pair of polished black shoes. A collared shirt was folded over the back of the chair at a small desk in the corner of the room. Raphael's arms stretched out before him, and he could feel the movement of his muscles.

His skin was a pale olive. He had five slender fingers on each human hand.

One thing remained in common with his current predicament, though; he was not the one in control of this body. And there was a strange pressure around his mind.

_I'm inside Saki's head,_ he realised with a jolt of disorientation, _and Ch'rell is in control. This is his memory._

The knowledge did nothing to quell the insistent reality of it. He felt the worn carpet pass under his sensitive bare feet as Ch'rell forced the helpless Saki to cross the room. His arm reached out and picked up an old-style corded telephone from the desk.

_Please, do not do this,_ an unfamiliar voice begged inside Raph's mind. A second later he realised that the words had been spoken in Japanese. Moving smoothly, his fingers began to dial an international phone number.

_Stop!_ The unfamiliar voice continued, desperate now. _Please… just let me talk to her, I will come up with something to explain… it does not have to be this way!_

Raphael could feel the phone pressed to his ear. On the other end of the line, it began to ring.

_I will give you anything, I will do anything you want…_

There was a click as the call connected.

"Hello?" a young woman answered breathlessly.

Raphael opened his mouth, and the same Japanese voice issued from his throat. "Yumiko. It's me."

"I thought it would be you! We've been waiting for your call." The woman sounded so full of joy.

_I really don't wanna hear this, _Raph realised with a sinking feeling. He tried to pull himself out of the memory, but it was useless. Ch'rell had trapped him here, just as he had trapped Oroku Saki into making this phone call.

"How are you?" Raphael asked. "How is Akira?"

"We are both well, love. But we miss you. 'Kira, your father is on the phone!" Dimly, the happy squeal of a child carried down the line.

Inside Raph's head, Saki had begun to sob.

"I have something to tell you," he said.

"Oh, is it the new apartment? Did you get it? I can't wait until we can join you there – my mother is driving me crazy! I love the woman, but honestly. The other day she–"

"- It's not about the new apartment," Saki's cool voice cut through her excited burble. "It's something else."

"What is it?"

_Apologies, my friend, but it needs to be done,_ came the memory of Ch'rell's thoughts. He did not sound sorry in the slightest.

"What's wrong?" Yumiko's voice was softer now. "I can always tell when something is wrong."

"You know that my business has been going well here. But I've started to think that this isn't going to work."

"But what do you mean? I thought you had just been promoted to a new position – I thought we would be coming to New York soon!"

"Yumiko," Ch'rell puppeted the man patiently, "there isn't an easy way for me to tell you this. So I'm just going to come right out and say it: I'm seeing someone else."

"… _What?_" the woman whispered, barely audible.

"Her name is Veronica. We met through work. I didn't mean for this happen, but there are some things one cannot control. We fell in love with each other. I'm sorry."

"I… I don't understand. Why are you doing this – how could this happen?"

"Veronica will be moving into the apartment with me."

"Have you lost your mind? We have a _child_, we have plans! We have a future together!"

"No," he corrected her. "Not any more." He could hear her beginning to cry, but he spoke over her. "I think it will be best for both of us if we make this a clean separation. I won't be giving you my new contact details. I want you to forget about me; we can both start a new life."

"But I love you," her voice broke. "Please, please think about this. I don't want a new life! I want us to raise our daughter together. I want to be with you."

"I will sort out the divorce papers and have them sent to you. Goodbye, Yumiko," he said, and hung up the phone firmly.

Raph blinked. He was back in his own body, in the darkened dojo, chained to the wall. Someone was still awake out in the Lair, because there was a thin strip of light showing under the door. He didn't know how much time had passed.

_As I told you_, Ch'rell thought, almost gently, _I have done this before._

Raph couldn't answer him. He could still feel one Mr. Oroku Saki's heart breaking inside his chest. He could feel it as if it were his own.

**.:…:.**


	6. The Morning After

_**A/n: **_Sorry about the slight delay for this chapter – I got distracted by things like political protests, federal elections, job interviews, and starting full time work. To be honest I'm not sure I'm entirely satisfied with this chapter, but I can't put my finger on why – so I'd really appreciate any feedback you might have on it!

Thanks for reading. :)

* * *

_**Chapter 6 – The Morning After**_

**.:…:.**

Splinter was wide awake when he heard his eldest son knock on the door of his bedroom the next morning. He was sitting up in bed, his body well-rested courtesy of the pain medication that Donatello had insisted he take. A dull ache emanated from his ribs every time he drew breath, but it was bearable; his chest was sheathed in thick rolls of bandages. It was his mind that was not at ease.

"Enter," he said, more quickly than he normally would. His voice came out as a hoarse rasp, barely there, but the door opened anyway.

The effort had made Splinter fall into a fit of coughing. Almost immediately there was a cool glass of water in front of him, and Leonardo was assisting him to drink.

"Thank you," he whispered, when his voice was under control. His throat felt as if it had been put through a meat grinder, but he masked his discomfort in the face of more important things. He chose his words carefully to conserve energy – he knew that if he spoke too much, his son would order him to rest his voice. "Raphael?"

Leo sighed, and the worry in the sound made Splinter's hands tighten imperceptibly over his bed sheets. His son lifted the bowl of thin soup and the spoon that was provided for his breakfast, but Splinter put one hand on his arm, demanding answers with his eyes. He could not eat without knowing what had happened last night after Donatello had bandaged him up.

Leonardo reluctantly placed the bowl down again, recognising the unspoken order. "You were right, Master. Raphael wasn't acting as himself. The Shredder is controlling him. He's inside his mind. And while they're linked, we can't kill the Shredder without harming Raph as well."

Leo stared down at the bed sheets as he explained what the Shredder had told them the night before. Splinter's heart sank further as he beheld his son's face. He could tell the situation was grave, because Leonardo had never been able to meet his Master's eyes when he had to deliver very bad news.

Splinter grew even more tense as Leonardo described his foray into the astral plane and what he had found there. His thoughts boiled under the surface, but he managed to keep most of his anger off his face. _You have gone too far this time, Shredder. I did not think that you could sink any lower, but you have crossed one final line._

"Sensei?" Leonardo's voice broke into his thoughts. "Are you alright? Should I get Don to give you some more medication?"

He shook his head, grimacing. "I need to go to Raphael," he forced out. "I must see him." He leaned forward in preparation to rise from his bed, but with that movement his ribs seemed to grate together under their bandages. He fell back against his pillow with a soft grunt, frustrated at his own weakness and struggling to express it through the mass of bruises around his throat. _Such a simple thing, speech, _the thought flitted through his mind. _One never really thinks much of it until the ability to do so is taken away. Oh, Raphael._

Leonardo had risen from his bedside chair, pressing down on Splinter's shoulders gently so that he would not try to rise again. "Please, Master Splinter, you still need to rest right now. I'll talk to Don and find out how soon you can be moving around. But believe me when I say that Raph isn't going anywhere. Don put a lock on the door last night. Not that any of us could get much sleep anyway, with the Shredder under our roof."

He picked up the bowl again, and this time Splinter let him, recognising the necessity of it and the fact that he wouldn't make it out of his bed without the blessing of the family medic, so it was best to stay on Donatello's good side and eat whatever food he had provided him with.

"He wants to negotiate," Leonardo continued as he lifted the spoon to Splinter's lips, and carefully helped him to sip small mouthfuls. His throat worked to swallow. "I don't even know what he wants from us. I think he originally jumped Raph just to get out of TCRI; but if that was all he wanted, you'd think he would've abandoned ship as soon as we made it out. I get the feeling he's going to milk this situation for all it's worth."

Splinter sipped his breakfast quietly, listening to his son's words and all of the other unspoken things in his tone, his face, his body language. Leonardo continued.

"When I meditated and made contact with Raph's mind, last night, he… I don't think he's in any immediate danger. But it was awful, Sensei. He was trapped. And there was nothing I could do."

Splinter gave his eldest a quelling look, trying to convey that self-blame was a counter-productive emotion right now. He wished that he hadn't been injured last night, because he did not want Leonardo burdened with this while he was incapacitated. Shredder was _his_ enemy first, and this was a father's job. Raphael was his responsibility.

Leonardo had lapsed into silence as he helped Splinter finish the food.

"I must see Raphael," Splinter whispered again when the bowl was empty. _I must see his condition for myself. I must confront the Shredder._

"I'll ask Don," Leo promised again as he gathered up the tray and prepared to leave. Splinter nodded his thanks, and sat back against his pillows once his son had gone. He could not hold back the sigh that escaped him now that he was alone.

He had hoped so very badly that he had been wrong. But he had known, really, from the second that Raphael had knocked him down and got his hands around his throat. Certainly, he had felt Raphael's anger directed at him in the past. There had even been tear-filled incidents when his children were much younger where Raphael had claimed to "hate" him, stomped off to his room and slammed the door. But Splinter had known, looking up into Raphael's murderous face last night, that such hatred as he saw there could only have come from the Shredder.

He did not want to remember that expression on his son's face.

**.:…:.  
**

Mikey could hear quiet voices coming from the Lair beyond his bedroom door. He listened for a while, considering the idea of hiding under his blankets again and pretending really hard that yesterday's events had been nothing but a bad dream. He'd been doing that for most of last night, staring sleeplessly at his ceiling, and it hadn't worked so far.

Giving up on the power of positive thinking (or maybe he would just come clean to himself and call it denial), he threw off his blankets, tied on his mask and pads, and made his way to the kitchen.

Don was sitting at the kitchen table, looking down morosely at the phone in his hands as if it were the cause of all his woes.

"More bad news?" asked Mikey from the doorway.

"Hmm?" Don looked up. "Oh, no, it's not that. I mean, only the same bad news as yesterday. I just got off the phone with April – she was wondering why Leo hadn't called with the explanation he promised. I had to tell her what's going on."

"Oh," said Mikey. Yeah, he could sympathise. It sucked being the bearer of bad news. And when the news involved your arch-nemesis being a mind-controlling alien currently renting space in your brother's mind and learning all of his secrets…

_April and Casey are going to be put in danger because of this too_, Mike realised, with a further sinking feeling. 'Their locations would be compromised', as Leo would probably say. The expression on Don's face told Mike clearly that Don had already discussed this with April, and he hadn't enjoyed the discussion.

"Has anyone eaten anything yet?" he asked, mostly as a distraction.

"Leo took breakfast in for Master Splinter. They're in his room talking at the moment. Well, hopefully Leo is the only one doing the talking, because Sensei is supposed to be resting his throat." The Doctor Look flashed across Don's face, and then was gone. "Apart from that, I think everyone's been too distracted for food."

"Well finally! Something I can do!" Mikey went to the cupboards and began clattering saucepans about with a purposeful air. A big oily breakfast was just the thing for this sort of situation, right? Or maybe that was for hangovers. Whatever. Making breakfast was better than sitting around and not knowing what to do with himself.

He rummaged deep inside the fridge while he asked his next question, keeping his voice carefully neutral. "Has anyone talked to Raph this morning?"

"Uhh…" Don sounded shifty. "I poked my head in earlier to make sure Shredder was still there."

"So I'm guessing Raph hasn't eaten either."

"Hey, can you blame me if serving the Shredder 'breakfast in bed' weirds me out a little?"

"Nah, I know how you feel. But we can't starve him to death, dude." He pulled out the package of bacon and a whole carton of eggs from the fridge.

"I know," Don sighed, finally flipping his phone shut and replacing it in his belt. "Look, I've got to get back to some research. I mean, it's not much – there's not exactly a handy Wikipedia entry about Utroms. I'm just reading up on some neuroscience articles to see if I can find anything even remotely related to what's going on here. If I could just get a handle on what we're _dealing_ with…"

Yep. Only his brother Donatello could say casually that he was 'just' reading up on neuroscience, and make it sound convincing.

"You do what you need to do," said Mikey, sounding more confident than he felt. "I'll take breakfast in to Raph. If you're lucky, I might even bring you some coffee later."

Don rose from the table gratefully, but as he started to leave he looked back and paused. "Be careful, okay? Don't let him get to you."

"Psh," he flapped a hand dismissively. "Raph could never get to _me_; I've spent too long perfecting the art of getting under _his_ skin, so I know how it works."

"I wasn't talking about Raph."

"Yeah. I know you weren't."

"Okay." Don nodded to him and disappeared back into his lab.

As Mikey started to throw breakfast together, alone in the kitchen with only the smells of frying food to distract him, he began repeating a mantra in his mind. _I will not psych myself out. I will not psych myself out. It's just Raph. I can handle Raph, even at his grumpiest._

But it wasn't just Raph. He knew that. _I can handle this,_ he told himself firmly, amending his mantra. He jabbed at the eggs with a bit more force than strictly necessary.

When everything was done cooking he served up one plate and left the rest for Leo and Don to find. He poured a glass of juice to round out what counted in his terms as a healthy, nutritious breakfast. _Yeah,_ said the sarcastic little voice inside his head, _your cooking is so fantastic that it's going to magically cure Raph and everything will be back to normal. Gosh, you're so helpful._ Mikey squashed the little voice and carried the plate and glass over to the dojo. He had to put them down to unbolt the door.

He was ready for anything when he entered; either an alien jumping off the roof to land on his head, or one still snoozing away on the dojo floor. He found neither. The Shredder was still plastered around Raph's head like an ugly leech, and Raph himself was sitting up, straight but relaxed, his eyes on the food in Mikey's hands.

"So you survived the night, huh?" said Mikey, approaching his brother cautiously.

It was Raph's voice that answered him. "More or less. Not exactly the most comfortable bed I've ever slept in though, I've gotta say."

"And you think you deserve comfort in this situation _why_?"

"Well it looks like I'm worthy of breakfast, at least," Raph said with approval. Mikey came to sit on the mat in front of him, putting the food down but not yet allowing himself to be lulled into a false sense of security. _He sounds so __**normal**_, he thought, glancing up at Shredder's alien body and then away again, quickly.

"You're not worthy of anything," he said to Shredder, "but I'm not about to let my brother go hungry just 'cause he's fallen in with some bad company."

"Aww, ain't that sweet."

_He's even got Raph's grouchy-morning-voice down pat_, Mikey marvelled. If it wasn't so incredibly disturbing, he almost could have been impressed. He picked up the plate again, and then he paused. "So, uh, how are we gonna do this? Do I have to spoon-feed you? Or, if I let one of your hands free, will you, like, promise not to stab me with the spoon?"

"I dunno," Raph drawled. "Usually I kick ass with spoons."

Michelangelo smiled in spite of himself. "Yeah, I've noticed that recently. You're good at making them into lethal weapons. But I don't wanna lose my eye or anything, so you have to promise."

"Don't you trust me?"

Mikey's easy smile didn't flicker. "Not even the tiniest bit."

"Oh," said Raphael neutrally, and Mikey felt with a small twinge of satisfaction that Shredder had conceded a point to him. He stood and went to retrieve the padlock keys from the hook on the wall just outside the dojo. When he came back to kneel beside Raph again, he hesitated for a long moment before he could bring himself to move within striking distance. Slowly, he reached behind Raph and unlocked the chains around one of his hands, and then he retreated quickly.

Shredder cocked one of Raph's eyebrows at him. "What? I ain't gonna bite the hand that feeds me." Shredder pulled his wrist in front of him and rotated it a few times to get the stiffness out. Mikey watched him closely, but he was merely intent on snagging the plate and dragging it closer to himself. He ate with Raphael's usual lack of table manners, and Mikey felt slightly ill as he watched.

"What do you want with us?" he finally blurted out, when he could no longer stand the sounds of the Shredder enjoying his meal. The plate was clean before he answered.

"I want the same thing as you do," Shredder said casually. "All I need is a guarantee of safe passage out of here, and your brother will be free and good as new."

_Could it really be that simple?_ Mikey wondered. _Nah… Nothing's ever simple when it comes to Shredder._

"Look," said Raph, "we can talk about that stuff later. It's not like _you_ get any say in what happens, anyway."

Okay, that one stung because Mikey knew it was kind of true.

Raph continued. "Right now, we've got more important things to worry about."

"Like what?"

"Like the fact that I really need to visit the bathroom."

"Ah," said Mikey. He hadn't really thought about this part.

"So could ya get me outta these chains already?" Raph prompted when he didn't immediately move. "It's kinda urgent."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"C'mon, Mike, don't be such a goddamn wimp. Nothing's gonna happen. What, you wanna be the one who gets to scrub the floor in here?"

"No, I really don't. And also? _Eww._ I have a better plan."

**.:…:.**

It was a crafty and cunning plan, involving both Leonardo and Michelangelo, as well as a secret weapon.

The first step was scouring the bathroom and removing anything that had even the slightest potential for use as a weapon (which, in Leonardo's cautious estimation, was quite a lot). Once that was done, Leo and Mikey had gone to unchain Raph from the wall in the dojo. They had helped him to his feet and then hadn't let go, keeping a firm hold on both of his arms. Raph had rolled his eyes at them, muttering something they both ignored about 'not needing assistance to take a piss', but he'd allowed himself to be led to the bathroom without causing any trouble.

Mercifully, they had decided that it wasn't necessary to accompany him inside, which is why Leo and Mikey now found themselves in the awkward position of guarding the door and studiously ignoring the sounds of Raph going about his business.

"Shredder playing house-guest has even more drawbacks than I originally thought," said Mikey gloomily.

"Well, hopefully he won't be here for long," said Leo, his eyes not leaving the door. It opened just as he finished speaking, and both of them unconsciously shifted their stances, ready for anything.

"You guys know that I can hear you, right?" Raph said, stepping out of the bathroom. He came forward and held out his arms to be restrained again, sighing in an exaggerated display of resignation.

Mikey went to grasp him by the shoulder, but Shredder was already moving. He'd ducked underneath the reaching hands and made a rush for the open space of the Lair, a grimace of determination on Raph's face.

Mikey felt the adrenaline spike into his system instantaneously, and in less than a second he was giving chase.

"DON!" Leo bellowed, his footsteps pounding behind him.

In the end, the Shredder didn't even make it to the door of the Lair. Don stepped out from the kitchen, a loaded tranquilliser gun ready in his hands. The first dart skittered off Raphael's plastron, but the second followed immediately after and found its mark in the hollow above his left collarbone. It was swift-acting – a chemical mix that Don had devised himself – and Shredder's headlong charge was abruptly reduced to an unmoving, tangled heap of turtle on the floor.

Mikey came forward to stand with his two brothers in a circle around Raph. His heart was still thumping away in his chest, heedless of the fact that the action seemed to be over for now. Don still nursed his tranq gun, his knuckles white.

"Told you we'd need the secret weapon," Mike said to Leo.

Leo nodded, his face stern. "He's trying to act like Raph to get us to lower our guard; he'll be out of here the first opportunity we give him."

Mikey wondered what would happen if Shredder ever made it out of that door. They'd never see Raph again, probably.

"We won't let that happen." He made his words a promise.

Don surprised them by moving abruptly to the couch and dropping the gun on it as if he couldn't bear to touch it any longer. He drew a deep breath, visibly steadying himself. It took a moment or two, but when he spoke, his voice was even.

"Let's get him back into the dojo."

**.:…:.**


	7. Dreams and Memories

_**A/n: **_Why hello there, it's been a while! Strange to think that in between this chapter and the last one I've written and completed the whole first draft of an original novel… hooray for Nanowrimo! Anyway, I apologise for the delay, but I should have a bit more time to work on fanfiction now. I hope you enjoy the next chapter. Consider it a Christmas present to you all! :)

* * *

_**Chapter 7**_

**Dreams and Memories**

******.:…:.**  


Raphael dreamed that he was in a warm, dark space. His brothers were around him, and Master Splinter was nearby. It was a strange dream, because he couldn't see any of them, but he knew with the absolute certainty that only comes in dreams that his family were all there. He could sense the slight heat from their bodies, feel the vibrations that their slow, peaceful breaths left in the air. He was young. He was sleepy, but content. In the dream, he wondered if this was a memory.

**.:…:.**

He was standing on the bridge of a space ship. He could read the alien script of the control panel in front of him. Above it, a three-dimensional hologram showed a view from space of a small, pinkish planet. Fiery explosions bloomed across its surface like bloodstains.

**.:…:.**

Raph dreamed that Mikey was staring at him with a look of horror.

There was a spoon in Raph's hand. He used it to stab out his brother's eyes.

"Out, out, vile jelly!" said Michelangelo, and his ruined face laughed.

**.:…:.**

He stood before a crowd of millions. They cried out in terror and in awe, and they bowed down before him.

It still would not be enough.

**.:…:.**

Raph dreamed that Casey didn't want to hang out with him any more because the Shredder-alien attached to his head made conversations awkward, and all of the street punks they went out to beat up just laughed at them instead.

"You tried to kill your own Dad, man," said dream-Casey in a typically blunt fashion. "That is so not cool."

_Goddamnit,_ thought Raph in the dream, _why the hell is _Casey_ the voice of my subconscious?_

**.:…:.**

He dreams of carnage, because fear in others meant power for himself. He remembers thousands of beings begging for their lives. He remembers the icy black emptiness of space, even though he has not been able to return to it now for some time. He remembers Utrom eyes looking at him, and he is flooded with an old rage. And then something deeper.

**.:…:.**

In his dream, Raphael is flooded with an old rage. It's Leonardo again. Leonardo, always standing in between him and the doorway, between purgatory and freedom.

"You can't go out that way," said dream-Leonardo. "The door's locked."

Behind him, where the door to the Lair should have been, there was only a featureless brick wall.

**.:…:.**

"This pod will remain locked at all times," ordered Commander Mortu. "Communication with the prisoner is forbidden. We must maintain the highest level of security."

The troop whirred away on their hovering discs, and the prisoner was left alone with his captor.

"After all this time, Mortu, you still believe that you have won? You used to know me better than that, old friend."

Mortu dimmed the lights around the containment unit and made to leave the chamber. He paused in the doorway, his tentacles tense on his disc. "Do _not_ call me your friend."

"But you were, once."

"To my ever-lasting shame." Mortu's voice was thick with self-disgust.

"No. To your ever-lasting _fear_."

The lights faded. Mortu was gone.

**.:…:.**

Raph was in a dark cavern. The stone walls dripped with water and slime. Someone was chasing him. Familiar laughter echoed distantly down the twisting passageways behind him.

He ran faster, his lungs straining for air. The stone passage he was following branched into three, and he picked a random direction in the hopes that he would lose the thing that was hunting him. It didn't work. Whichever way he turned, the laughter drew closer.

The path he was following rounded a bend and then ended abruptly in a sheer stone wall. His heart slammed against his rib cage in panic, and he spun to face his attacker.

The Shredder stood before him in full armour, his red eyes glowing with triumph behind the slits of his helmet. Raph's sai flew into his hands, and he shifted into an offensive stance. _Cornered. Nothing to do now but fight._

"Nothing to do now but _die_," the Shredder corrected him out loud.

Raph knew that he had no hope of winning this battle, fighting alone. He attacked anyway, and the stone tunnel erupted with the sound of steel clashing against steel.

He ducked a swipe of the vicious claws. The Shredder seemed to know every move he was going to make before he had even shifted his muscles to make it. His every attack was predicted and blocked, his every feint was ignored.

Shredder landed a powerful kick to Raph's chest that sent him flying backwards. His shell absorbed most of the blow against the wall, and he rolled and came up charging. Somehow he managed to get under the Shredder's guard, and with a grunt he reversed his grip on one sai and bashed the hilt of it into Shredder's helmet.

The helmet went flying off, clanging against a wall and rolling noisily out of sight. Raph dropped and spun away from his adversary to avoid a counterattack.

It never came.

The Shredder began to laugh again, that familiar, slow, infuriating laugh – the one that seemed to say, _I know something you don't know._ Raphael was filled with a creeping dread. He did not want to look at the Shredder's face. He knew this and felt it with all of his being, yet still his gaze travelled unwillingly up his opponent's body, dragged against his will by some invisible force, until he was looking straight into the Shredder's red, laughing eyes.

It was his own face looking back at him.

**.:…:.**

Raph would normally have jerked awake yelling and fighting from a dream like that, but his body remained silent and still. The strangeness of this was lost in the relief of being awake and out of that completely-fucked-up dream. _Wow, my subconscious is majorly screwed,_ he thought to himself idly. _Heh. Better get up for breakfast before Mikey eats the last of my cereal, the little bastard._

He remained blissfully forgetful of his current situation right up until the moment when he went to open his eyes, and his eyelids were unresponsive. His world stayed stubbornly dark.

The ugly reality of his captivity crashed over him in a wave. _No wonder my dreams were fucked_, he thought sourly to himself. He still felt sort of groggy from whatever Don had shot him with._ Geez… were some of those dreams even _mine_?_

_You should not have seen those_, echoed Ch'rell's disdainful thoughts in his head. _The drugs your brother introduced us to must have interfered with the bond. _

_Interfered with the bond, huh?_ thought Raph, feeling a spark of hope. _You mean if Don only dopes me up enough, he'll be able to get your slimy ass offa me?_

_Hardly. It would take much more then Earth chemicals to destroy the bond. If anything, they only blurred the boundaries, made it deeper._ Ch'rell went silent then, and the wheels in Raph's head began to turn.

_They were your dreams that I saw, weren't they? Or maybe your memories._

_They are none of your concern,_ Ch'rell sneered. But Raph could tell he'd hit a nerve, and he pressed on.

_Seems like everything you've done, everything you've destroyed, still hasn't been enough for ya, has it? Heh… Ch'rell has iiissuuuues… _He made his mental voice mimic the incredibly annoying sing-song tone that Mikey used when he had a death wish. It seemed to be working, because he could sense Ch'rell's irritation growing. _Whatsa matter? Don't like it when your stupid mind-meld trick goes both ways? You're the one who invaded me, slimeball. Wasn't such a great idea if you wanted ta keep yer little self esteem problems a secret._

Ch'rell's anger suddenly evaporated into a dark amusement. _You think that's what you were seeing? How delightfully ironic. And what about your dream, hmm? Just who is under the helmet, Raphael?_ He dragged the dream-memory out and forced it upon Raph's mind again, and instantly Raph was filled with the same self-revulsion and horror. The image of himself as the Shredder was pressed like a burning brand into his mind, and he shrunk back from it, tried to twist away from it. The dream-memory took a few seconds to fade, and when it did it left him cold and wordless.

_You know,_ Ch'rell considered, _I had been thinking up until now that I would have preferred Leonardo or the rat to be my host body. But this darkness in you… perhaps you have more potential than I first thought. You were right, in your dream. We are more alike than you realise._

_Bullshit_, thought Raph, feeling truly nauseous. _I'm nothin' like you._

Ch'rell laughed. _We shall see._

As often happened, Raph's fear reached a boiling point and transformed itself into anger. _Yeah? Well fuck you and your psychoanalysis _bullshit. _You can't just walk in on your stupid freakin' tentacles, take a stroll around my head, and pretend that you know the first thing about me. But _you_ – you I already know. You're an evil, sadistic bastard. And what the hell is up with you and Mr. Mortu, huh? Obviously somethin' goin' on there._

_You don't need to know my history, little turtle._ Ch'rell began to draw his mind away, but Raph latched on to the idea, determined to force some sort of confession out of his enemy.

_Guess you did somethin' to piss him off, huh? And he ditched you, because Mortu is a guy who actually has a conscience._

_You will drop this. _Ch'rell's thought was cold and sharp as ice. It set off tiny little warning bells in Raph's head – and later he would regret ignoring them, but he couldn't help himself. He had to dig just that little bit deeper.

_So that's your sensitive spot. Ch'rell's dark, tragic past. The price you paid for – _

_You want to know my history, little turtle? _Ch'rell snarled in fury. _Would you like to delve into some of my memories? Here, let me show you. Let me show you, since you want it so badly._

**.:…:.**

Raph was no longer in the dojo. He was standing on the rooftops of New York, under a dark and ominous sky. He could smell the electric tang of the storm in the air. The rain had just begun to fall. It rattled against the heavy battle armour that he wore, and the lightning reflected coldly off the long claws of his gauntlet.

And Raph _knew_, immediately. This stormy New York morning was not one that he would ever forget. But he didn't want to remember. And he definitely didn't want to remember it like _this_.

_Alright, alright, _he thought with foreboding, _I'll give it a rest with the fifty questions. I get the message._

Ch'rell did not reply. Raph was stuck in his memories again, the same as he had been in the memory of Oroku Saki. He was in a body that was not his own, and he knew it should feel strange, but because the memory was Ch'rell's he felt comfortable inside the robot body and the Shredder's armour. He was seeing out of the Shredder's eyes, higher above the ground than he was used to. The most disconcerting thing, though, was the large ring of Foot ninja that stood around him on the rooftop, and the completely calm and commanding way his gaze swept over them.

"Let the hunt begin," Raph said in the Shredder's voice, and the ninja scurried to do his bidding.

The memory dissolved and then re-formed around him. There was a single Foot ninja standing before him, breathing heavily.

"We've found him, Master. The first group has already engaged."

"Leonardo," Raph said coldly. His lips curled into a smile of anticipation beneath his helmet. "Take me to him. I want to watch the battle."

_No I don't, _thought Raph, _I don't. _Leo had never told anyone exactly what had happened that night. Raph had always hoped that someday he would – but even though he couldn't deny his own curiosity, this was not the way he wanted to find out.

This felt like a betrayal.

And there was Leo, moving smoothly over the rooftops, shadowed by a small group of Foot ninja. Raph was perched above them all, an unseen metal gargoyle. The scent of the storm filled his nose.

Once he reached an open space, Leonardo slid to a halt on the rain-slicked roof and turned to engage his attackers. There were not enough of them to defeat him, not yet. But Shredder watched patiently, and Raph watched with him, shadowing Leonardo as he moved between buildings, searching for the best strategic battle ground against ever-increasing numbers of enemies.

Raph could see him starting to grow tired. His stance and his movements remained as sharp and unflawed as ever, but his shoulders were heaving with each panting breath. When three Foot-tech ninjas appeared before him, the first flicker of fear showed on Leo's face. The Shredder saw it too, and Raph felt his triumph as if it were his own.

The Foot-tech wavered into invisibility. They landed some solid blows, and Raph winced at each one. He clearly felt the Shredder's flash of irritation when one of them threw Leo off the side of the building.

_Fools, _thought Raph, _I told them that I wanted to finish him myself!_

… _No, that wasn't me._ Raph clung desperately to his self-identity, afraid of losing himself inside Ch'rell's memory. _God, I don't want to _enjoy_ this…_

Leo had stopped himself falling somehow, and clambered back up onto the next rooftop. He set his jaw with determination, and then twisted his mask sideways to serve as a blindfold.

In three strikes, he took the Foot-tech down.

Despite his situation, and despite knowing the ultimate outcome of this battle, Raph couldn't help feeling a flash of pride. He'd seen his brother in training and sparred with him in the dojo, but he'd never been able to watch him in action like this. In other battles they'd been involved in, Raph had always had his own opponents to focus on. Now, he could do nothing but watch. There was no denying it, and there was no other word for it; in that moment, Leo was _cool_.

He tried to hold on to that feeling as Hun stepped out of the shadows to take his turn. His brother wins that fight, too, but now when he runs he is starting to sound desperate. Raph can almost hear his harsh panting from the opposite rooftop. He couldn't hold it in any more. Leo was running for his life now, with a whole legion of Foot ninja giving chase – as well as Hun, looking bruised and dangerous.

_So this is how it happened, _Raph thought, his heart beginning to pound with an old fear. _They ran him down like a dog._ He directed a sudden flash of anger towards Ch'rell's mind. _You're disgusting!_ The memory did not even flicker.

Leo skidded to a stop for one last time, and Raph knew this was the end of the line. On the corner down below them, he could just make out the sign of April's shop. They'd herded him back here – somehow, Shredder had found where they were hiding – and now, Raph knew, he'd planned this whole attack to scare them, as well as defeat them. And for a while, it had worked.

As he watched, Leo landed another blow on Hun, and looked grimly determined to fight on. But then all of the Foot paused, and turned. The four Elite had appeared above the fray. In the darkness and the driving rain, their cloaks swirling about them, they sent a chill through Raph's body. He could see Leo's fear in the tense line of his muscles. At that moment, all of the Foot and the Elite turned in silence and bowed low to Raph where he stood on the opposite rooftop, the Shredder's armour outlined and glinting against the black sky. Raph met his exhausted brother's eyes and saw the moment of the terrible realisation there. He felt the Shredder's spike of elation.

In a swirl of their ragged cloaks, the Elite were surrounding Leo, and battle began again.

Leonardo was losing, and he knew it. He was knocked down onto his hands and knees, his katana scraping clumsily against the concrete.

Raph realised dimly that he was straining against the memory, trying to push through it and leap down to his brother's aid. It didn't matter that this battle was long over and the past was unchangeable; his instincts would not let him stand by and do nothing. But he had no choice.

The Shredder watched unmoving as Leo's hands clenched on his swords, his head hanging down, the knowledge of his own defeat clear to read in every exhausted line of his body.

Leo knew that he was going to die. Raph was looking at the moment that had almost broken his brother. It was something private, something that he never should have seen. Leonardo was sixteen, alone, afraid, and he was going to die.

With his final burst of energy, he pushed himself up with a harsh cry and continued to fight anyway.

Raph felt the inevitability of his brother's defeat. Leonardo screamed as he was thrown from the edge of the roof, and the window of April's shop shattered as he crashed through it. Raph had never forgotten that sound.

He leaped across to the opposite rooftop, landing inside the circle of Elite ninja. Leonardo's swords lay where they had fallen, in a dirty puddle of rainwater on the cement. One of the Elite kneeled down to retrieve them and offered them up to Raph where he stood. He took them. The weight of the stolen weapons in his hands filled him with a deep and dark satisfaction. He raised them over his head, and feeling nothing but pure elation, he bent his brother's weapons and felt the blades shatter between his hands.

**.:…:.**


	8. Faceoff

**A/N:** Many thanks to whoever it was that nominated me for the 2010 comp! I've been so out of it - I can't remember my SS login and password, so I didn't even know the nominations were open. Total surprise! And it reminded me how long it's been since the last update for this story (woops?) so I'm glad for the nudge.

I am beginning to realise that Ch'rell loves the sound of his own voice. He is such fun to write. Onwards, dear readers!

* * *

_**Chapter 8**_

**Face-off**

**.:…:.**

Don stood outside the locked and bolted door of the dojo. The key to the padlock holding Raph's chains was in his right hand, and there was a plastic case full of vials, swabs and small steel instruments under his left arm. He had been standing motionless and staring at the doorknob for approximately four minutes. _You're going to have to go in there eventually_, the rational part of his brain told him. _May as well get it over with._ It still took another minute before he could muster the determination to lift his right hand, unlock the door and open it.

It was early evening, and Raphael had been unconscious for most of the day. Don was still trying to cook up a tranquilliser that was fast-acting but with a shorter duration. He didn't want to have to use it on his brother again.

When he entered the dojo, Raphael and the Shredder were still slumped against the far wall. He stepped forward, relieved, but then Raph's eyes flicked open to look at him. So he was conscious again, after all. Don immediately dropped his own gaze to the floor. He stopped a few feet away from his brother and carefully put down the container he was carrying.

"Nice of you to drop by," said the Shredder in Raph's voice, sounding unfriendly. Don didn't look at him. He pulled open the plastic packet of cotton swabs and selected his first vial from the crate. He pulled off the stopper and poured a few drops of a clear liquid onto a swab that he held carefully between a pair of tweezers.

"And what exactly is that sposed to be?" Raph asked, eyeing the vial and looking unimpressed.

"I'm testing some chemicals to see if I can find something to get rid of you," Don said distantly, putting the stopper back into the vial with an overly-precise movement.

"I already told ya that ain't going to work."

"And you think I trust anything you say? A good scientist doesn't accept anything without evidence," he murmured, stepping closer to Shredder and crouching down to peer between the alien's flattened tentacles. It reminded Don a little bit of the way an octopus would cling to its prey. He then tried very hard not to think about how an octopus could use its arms to tear its prey apart and eat it. Very carefully, he lifted the tweezers and dabbed the cotton wad gently against the side of his brother's head, where the clear substance cemented the Shredder's slug-like body to the flesh. He wrinkled his nose in mild disgust as he poked at the tentacle, trying to lift it slightly for better access. He pulled back, peering closely to see if the chemical he'd applied had dissolved the adhesive at all. Reaching behind him, he grabbed a magnifying glass out of the crate for a closer look. Nothing seemed to have changed. If only he could manage to chip off a shard to examine under a microscope, he might have more of a chance of figuring out what this stuff was made of; but he couldn't exactly take a hammer and chisel to his brother's cranium.

The bored sigh that exploded below him was one hundred per cent Raph. He never did have any patience when Don was working on something delicate.

"You're wasting your time, Don. This ain't gonna help me."

Don said nothing. New cotton wad, next chemical. No result. He moved on to the next vial.

"And what's with the silent treatment?" Raph continued after a while. "Geez. Anyone would think that is was me who shot at _you_ with a huge freaking gun."

His hands didn't falter. No result with this one, either. Next chemical.

It was a long half an hour, and by the end of it, if it hadn't been for his brother under there, Don would have happily poured a whole bucket of flesh-eating acid over the Shredder's alien body. Nothing in his stores had budged the Shredder at all. He hadn't really been expecting anything to work, but it was depressing to have the Shredder's claims confirmed. He remained stoic as he packed up his supplies, not wanting his enemy to see his disappointment.

"This ain't even worth an 'I told ya so'," Raph grumbled.

Don clenched his teeth. "Someone will bring in food for you later," he said, hating the courtesy of it. Shredder might have muttered something else under his breath, but Don was already standing and walking out of the dojo. He shut the door firmly behind him.

**.:…:.**

In the end, it was Leo who brought in the plate of food. It was a simple rice dish, the kind of meal that Leo loved but Raph would never choose to eat himself. It would have to do.

Raph was sitting quietly against the wall when he entered. It was almost as if he'd been there all along, and the Shredder hadn't just tried to make a run for it from the instant they'd unchained him from the wall. As soon as Raph saw him he began to smirk, his eyes tracking his every movement. At first Leo thought it was just the food, but when he put the plate down in order to unlock one of Raph's hands, his eyes stayed on him, watching him strangely. He paused, crouched down with one hand on his brother's wrist and one hand on the padlock. "What? Do I have something on my face?" he asked, letting his irritation show.

"Oh, no," the Shredder reassured him blithely. "Raphael is just very happy to see you right now, that's all."

Leo frowned, wondering if there was any truth in what the Shredder said. He could sense some undercurrent there, but he thought it was more likely that Shredder had meant the opposite, so he let the matter drop. He twisted the key in the padlock, freeing one of his brother's hands. He stepped back and settled onto the mat, watching the Shredder eat with narrowed eyes.

"So, what's the plan, Fearless?" The nickname slipped easily from Raph's mouth in between forkfuls of rice. "Ya can't keep me chained up in here forever. When are we gonna start negotiating, like I said before?"

"Negotiating? You're a body-snatcher and you just made an attempt to run off with the body that you snatched – not that I needed any _more_ evidence that you cannot be trusted. There is no negotiating."

"So what, I'm the wallflower decorating the dojo for the rest of my life?"

"No. The plan is that we find a way to get rid of you. And then we get rid of you, and Raph goes free."

"I can spot a flaw in that plan," Shredder offered, shovelling more food into Raph's mouth. He didn't elaborate, and Leo didn't bother to ask. The less Shredder said, the better, he figured.

Leo couldn't stop his eyes being drawn to the tentacled alien that had wrapped itself around Raph's skill. He couldn't get used to it. All of the times he had met the Shredder in battle, this… _thing_ was what he had been fighting. It certainly helped to explain the Shredder's apparent ability to resurrect himself. It changed everything, somehow. Leo had always assumed the Shredder was a man – an evil and twisted one, certainly, but a man none the less, with human desires and fears. But the real Shredder was something else entirely.

"Why would they follow you?" he wondered, accidentally saying it out loud.

Raph's hand paused halfway to his mouth. "Who?"

"The Foot Clan. I'm fairly certain that all of your soldiers are human, so why on earth would they follow you? If big mutant turtles freak them out, I would have thought a small pink alien blob would have crossed a line for them somewhere."

"Stupid child." (It sounded strange, coming from Raph.) "I have been the founding father and the leader of the Foot Clan for countless generations. I walk as a human among them and they do not question me. They do not know my true physical form, and they do not need to know. They serve my purposes well enough."

"You've kept this secret for a thousand years? Nobody ever found out?" Leo was sceptical.

Raph's chin lowered, but his eyes peered up at Leo from under his brow. "The few who found out did not live long enough to spread the word."

The quiet threat hung in the air between them. After a moment, Leo settled further back on the mat. "And that's why there can be no negotiations between us. You want us dead too badly. The stakes are too high."

"Don't pretend that those feelings run only one way. Do you really think the rat wants to let me go free?"

Leo said nothing.

"Still, we have one goal in common, your family and I: freedom. I want it, and you want it for your brother."

"And we will have it," said a voice from the doorway. It was quiet, but travelled clearly across the room. Leo turned, surprised.

Master Splinter stood in the entrance to the dojo, leaning heavily on his stick. Leo could see white bandages underneath his robe. Donatello was hovering at his elbow, wearing the harried expression that he always wore when he'd been talked into something that he didn't quite agree with.

"Sensei!" Leo came quickly to his feet and went to help his father across the dojo floor. "Should you be walking around right now?" This question was mostly directed at Don.

"I didn't exactly _recommend_ it," Don muttered back under his breath, "but he should be okay if he makes sure to take it easy. _Very_ easy," he cautioned Splinter as he carefully folded his legs and sank down to sit in front of Raphael.

"I will be careful," Splinter promised calmly. "Thank you, my sons. You may leave us now."

Leo heard the clear dismissal in his voice, took one look at the staring contest developing between Splinter and the Shredder, and made a beeline for the door, taking Don along with him. "Just call us if you need anything," he said on his way out.

In the safety of the kitchen, he turned to face Don. "Are you sure he'll be okay?"

Don sighed as if he'd been expecting the question. "He couldn't stay away any longer. And… I think we really need his guidance right now."

Leo had noticed the bags forming under his brother's eyes, and abruptly he wished he hadn't questioned him. "It's okay, Don, I know you wouldn't have let him out of bed if there was any serious risk. It's just… the last time those two were together, Raph – no, _Shredder,_" he corrected himself "– almost killed him."

"I'm hoping that the tables will be turned a bit, this time. You saw the look on Sensei's face, didn't you?"

Leo nodded. He knew that he would hate to see that expression on his father's face looking back at him. _Poor Raph_, he thought, _caught in between. I wonder how he's feeling right now._

**.:…:.**

Raphael was smiling again. Splinter felt his whiskers twitch in irritation, but other than that he gave no outward sign of his mood. He stared into his son's eyes in silence for a long time, seeking his enemy behind them. The Shredder was making no attempt to conceal himself; he stared boldly back, letting Splinter be the one to break the icy silence that had descended upon them.

"I did not believe that you could stoop any lower, Shredder. But this cowardly act of taking my son hostage in his own mind has proven me wrong once again. You truly are without honour."

Raphael rolled his eyes. "Ninjas and their 'honour'. Of course I am without honour. I had none in the first place. It's a curiously human concept, and I'm outside such petty limitations. I learned enough to mimic your system of 'honour' to appease my Foot Soldiers. Their pathetic minds needed something to latch on to, some greater cause that they could believe in. Humans are a little unusual; on most planets I have found that the payment is usually enough."

"Honour is not a tool for one to use."

"And yet, here we are. Look at the power and influence it's brought me, in this city of yours." The chains clinked as he leaned forward conspiratorially. "But there's a way that you could stop me. It's the only honourable thing you could do; to save your city, your world. Right now, I'm powerless to protect myself. It would be so easy." He paused, waiting for Splinter to say something. He sat like a stone, and so the Shredder continued. "All you would have to do would be to stand and fetch one of the swords on your wall. I would not be able to disentangle my mind from Raphael's own fast enough to save myself. It would only take one quick stab through the heart, or perhaps you could slice his head from his neck. It would probably be a quick and painless death. Of course, there's always the chance that there might be a bit of screaming and bleeding, but you would have rid the world of Oroku Saki for good! It's a noble cause, don't you think? In time, I'm sure that even Raphael himself will come to agree with me."

Splinter drew one long breath in, held it, and then let it out again through his nose. "I will never allow harm to come to any one of my sons. Even if it would mean the end of you. You already know this."

"Yes, I do." Raphael sat back against the wall, his expression satisfied. "I wanted you to know that I know it, too. I don't want to waste my time listening to empty threats."

"That is well. I did not come here to threaten. I came here," said Splinter, "to teach."

**.:…:.**


	9. The First Lesson

**A/n:**Why hello there! Erm, since it's been a while, you may want to go back to the previous chapter and briefly refresh your memory of Splinter and Shredder's conversation, since you'll be sort of seeing Raph's side of it here. I won't hold you up from the next chapter any further, except to say that the next thing I'll be putting up will be a light-hearted one-shot to break up all this doom and gloom. Hurrah! All reviews are deeply appreciated. :)

* * *

**Chapter 9 – The First Lesson**

**.:…:.**

Watching silently from the inside, Raph could hardly follow the conversation. Meeting Leo's eyes after what Ch'rell had shown him was hard enough. Now, listening to Splinter's ragged voice, seeing how gingerly he sat and the thick bandages under the robe, he felt shrivelled with an awful guilt. He could remember every second of his attack in garish, technicolour detail.

_That's right_, Ch'rell whispered, _it was you who did this_. He wanted to deny it, but the words he would use to defend himself faded before they could fully form. Later he would realise that it wasn't only coming from himself, that the feeling was being pushed on to him from outside, but at that moment the weight of the guilt he felt was crushing. Without realising it, he was trying to speak – trying to reach out, to ask Splinter for forgiveness. Ch'rell ignored his silent struggle, holding his mind effortlessly in check. Raph subsided for a while, to listen.

Ch'rell was encouraging Splinter to kill him. Raph tensed as he watched his father's impassive face. It wasn't that he really believed Splinter was about to stab him through the heart; it was that Ch'rell was right. This was an opportunity to rid the world of the evil bug forever, and Splinter wasn't going to take it.

_I'm such an idiot,_ he fumed to himself. _How'd I get myself into this? I'm the only thing that's keeping him alive right now._

_And I will repay you in kind_, Ch'rell whispered as Splinter was speaking. _When we leave here and return to the Foot Clan, I will be the only thing keeping _you_ alive._

_I'm not going anywhere with you, buddy. _Raphael understood by now the futility of his resistance, but that certainly didn't mean that he was going to be cooperative.

"… I came here," Splinter was saying, "to teach."

In those few words Raph could hear The Sensei in his father's voice, and he automatically snapped to attention.

"Is that so?" sneered Ch'rell through Raph's mouth. "And what could a rodent possibly have to teach me?"

"The lesson is not for you. It is for Raphael."

At this, Raph's focus sharpened even more. Splinter seemed somehow to look _past_ Ch'rell, giving Raph his most penetrating stare. He usually reserved that look for when Raph was in serious trouble, but right now, Raph found it immensely reassuring. Splinter was looking at him – not at his physical body, which didn't belong to him any more, but at _him_. Splinter would know what to do. He would know how to get him out of this.

"My son, I know that you can hear my words. I fear that what I am going to ask of you will not be easy, but you must trust me. Your brothers are also working to find a solution, but if we can take back your freedom for ourselves then perhaps it will not be necessary."

"Must I sit here and listen to all this wasted breath?" Ch'rell interjected.

Splinter raised his brows. "You are more than welcome to leave."

Ch'rell's glance flicked between Splinter and the door. "Not without my hostage. We've only just begun to get to know one another."

"Very well. Then you may listen or not, as you choose." Splinter shifted with a wince and resettled himself, his hands resting on his knees. Raph waited as his Sensei gathered the right words to begin the lesson, trying to ignore the resentful presence of Ch'rell all around him.

After a moment, Splinter spoke again. "Raphael, your training with your brothers has been both physical and mental. Though I know it has not been your favourite part of our lessons, it is the mental aspect of your strength that we must call upon now."

_I was afraid he was going to say that,_ Raph thought to himself, his hopes deflating slightly.

_What a waste of time_, Ch'rell thought in response. '_Mental strength'? You?_

"And your mind is stronger than you might think, my son," continued Splinter, as if he had guessed Raph's own doubts. "Your spirit burns brightly. Do not underestimate what you are capable of."

_You are not exactly known for being the most successful student, though, are you? _Ch'rell whispered again. Short flashes of memory bloomed in his mind without him recalling them – the frustrated tears blurring the pages of his first writing lessons, bruises earned through stupid mistakes in the dojo, and Splinter's sharp words that could run deeper than any cut. Leonardo kneeling reverently, receiving the katanas –

_That's not fair_, Raph managed to break into the memory-flow. _Even Leo sucked at some lessons. It took him forever to get his split-kick right._

Ch'rell might have overpowered him with more bitter memories, but at that point Splinter spoke again, and Ch'rell paused to listen. _You're curious_, Raph realised. _You don't know what he's planning_. Ch'rell did not respond to him.

"We have spoken in your training about your core self, the centre of your spiritual presence. It is this core that you must find now. You must pull all of your senses, all of your consciousness to this pinpoint. You must build a wall around this point strong enough to withstand your enemy, and then you must push this wall outwards. Reclaim what is yours piece by piece, until there is nowhere left for your enemy to hide."

Splinter had always been good at describing these abstract mental exercises. Raph could almost picture it, almost imagine what it would feel like. Could he really do it?

The most disconcerting thing was the aura of casual contempt that continued to waft from Ch'rell's mind. He didn't seem worried in the slightest.

_Of course not_, Ch'rell thought. _I'm merely bored of your pathetic family's attempts to dispose of me. As if I could be gotten rid of so easily._

_You ain't gonna stop me from tryin'._

_No, I'm not. It wouldn't be worth the effort. I'll let you try, and burn out all on your own._

Raph shoved him away, irritated, and listened as his Sensei spoke again. This would be a lesson he could not afford to fail.

"I do not expect you to succeed all at once," said Splinter. "The process may take some time, which is why we shall begin without delay. We will start by finding your core. Meditate with me, my son."

Of course, Ch'rell wasn't going to do anything so cooperative as close his eyes or steady his breathing. Raph remained tethered to his body. He had to try to pull himself away from his own senses, block out the light from the room and the feeling of his stiff muscles on the hard floor.

"I will try to guide you from this side," murmured splinter, his eyes already closed. "I will show you what I mean."

**.:…:.**

A few hours later, when a taciturn Master Splinter had finally emerged from the dojo, Don convinced him to eat a nutritious liquid meal and return to his own chambers to rest. This accomplished, he resigned himself once more to strategic brainstorming.

"Okay," Leo was saying wearily, "let's go over our options again. Maybe there's something or someone we've missed."

"The Utrom themselves are definitely out of reach," Don said regretfully. "I only know the basics of how the Transmat functions. From our experience I'd say the transportation was nearly instantaneous. The Utrom were out of our reach as soon as they stepped into the device. And nothing of the building is left. No convenient forwarding address."

"Maybe we should check it out anyway," said Mikey, not sounding very hopeful. "I mean, I know it did kinda look like there was nothing left. But we couldn't get up close when half the military was surrounding the building."

Don nodded thoughtfully. "That's true. Besides, maybe they left somebody behind. Maybe there were Utrom still outside somewhere when the building went into lockdown."

"It's possible," Leo conceded. "Alright. Later tonight I'll head over and spy out Foot HQ, see if there's any activity there and how many soldiers they have left. They must believe that their leader is dead. That will work to our advantage. They won't come looking for him – or us. Not until they've consolidated their forces."

"And I bet they wouldn't come looking for him _here_," said Mikey gloomily.

"The only thing they'll come looking for here is revenge," said Leo. "You two can swing by the TCRI block – poke around, see if anything turns up."

At that moment, there was a familiar hiss of hydraulics as the door of the lair opened. On edge, Leo stood up from the couch suddenly as if he was expecting the entire Foot army to come rushing inside.

"Hey guys," April said awkwardly, "it's just us."

"Yeah, don't panic," Casey added.

"Sorry," said Leo, some of the tension going out of his shoulders. "Come on in."

"I hope this isn't a bad time…" April began, and Mikey actually snorted with laughter. April relaxed a little and pulled a rueful face. "Well, okay, aside from the obvious badness. I thought you guys might need some supplies, since you've probably been too distracted to make it topside since you got back." She raised the two shopping bags in her hands, and carried them into the kitchen, Casey and the others trailing in behind her.

"Thanks, April," Don said sincerely, going to help her unpack. "It's been pretty crazy down here."

"So can we see Raph?" Casey asked quickly. He seemed to realise his blunder when the room went silent and the three brothers looked at each other.

"It's not really Raph in there," Don finally cautioned. "I mean… it is and it isn't."

"I'm not sure it's a great idea, Casey," said Leo. "Maybe the less exposure the two of you have to the Shredder, the better."

"C'mon, you guys said that he already knows everything that Raph knows. We don't have anything left to hide."

"I know," said Leo softly. "I'm sorry."

"Hey, I didn't mean it like that. It's just… I wanna know how he's doing. And I wanna see the thing we've been fighting all this time."

Leo sighed. "Alright," he said after a moment, "I'll let you in. But stay on your guard."

"Is he dangerous?"

"He's manipulative." The two of them went to the door of the dojo, and Leo paused, trying to think of the best warning to give. "Just remember who you're really talking to in there," he said, and slid back the bolt on the door. He stepped back and let Casey open it himself.

**.:…:.**

All of the shopping had been put away, and April had just finished filling the sink with warm, soapy water. Leo had recommenced the little council-of-war session in the lounge, and April knew there wasn't much she could contribute when it came to battle plans, if that's what they were discussing.

She was eyeing the large stack of dirty plates and pots critically, wondering where to begin, when she heard a sharp gasp from behind her. "Gah!" she spun around at the loud noise to see Mikey standing in the doorway, his hands planted on his cheeks in mock horror.

"April, you're stealing my thing!"

"Um, what thing?"

"My thing! The thing that I do when I have nothing useful to do but I need to feel like I'm doing something useful! You know?"

"Oh," said April sheepishly. She thought she did know, and Mikey sounded like he was only half-joking. "Sorry. Take it away."

He accepted the scrubbing brush she held out to him gracefully, and edged his way in between her and the sink.

"I thought you guys were busy planning something?" she said.

"Leo and Don are re-hashing. Endlessly. I got bored." He dropped the first of the dirty plates into the water with a clatter. "Please feel free to stay here and keep me company, though." He waved the scrubbing brush expansively.

"Okay," April smiled, and pulled up a chair. She was glad that she and Casey had come down here. At first she thought that they'd be getting in the way of what was, in effect, a military crisis. Well, maybe they were – who knows what mischief Casey was causing with Raph right at that moment – but at least she could do small things, like keeping Mikey company. He was wearing that skittish look that she recognised from previous times when he had too much on his mind and no one to talk to about it. Leo would be strategising and Don would be problem-solving and Splinter would be focused on the big picture, while Mikey in his own way would be holding them all together. April had known them all long enough now to recognise the patterns. "So, how are you holding up?"

"We'll get him back." Mikey scrubbed viciously at a dish, almost as if he was imagining it was Shredder's face.

"Of course you will," April agreed. He kept scrubbing. "I'm serious, Mikey. You will. Don told me that you guys survived an intergalactic adventure with space battles and aliens and robots. You guys can handle this."

"I guess so." His scrubbing became a fraction less vicious. "You know that he tried to kill Master Splinter, right?"

"Yes. Don told me that part, too. How is he? Splinter, I mean."

"Don couldn't keep him in bed for long. He's resting right now, but he was up this morning trying some funky meditation thing with Raph. I think he hopes that if Raph can just concentrate hard enough he can snap himself out of it, or something."

"Do you think it'll work?"

He shrugged helplessly. "I have no idea. Damnit!" He threw the brush into the water, and soapy bubbles flew up everywhere. He suddenly looked so frustrated and lost that April wondered if she should stand up and hug him. "We did all of that stuff you said. We made it to the other side of the universe and back, and we survived it all, and it took us weeks even though we were apparently only gone for a few hours. I just… I thought we'd get back and the world would give us a friggin' _break_. Raph is in there getting screwed around by the big bad evil, and all I can think of is 'geez, time out'." He sounded disgusted with himself. "How much more selfish can you get?"

At that point April did stand up, and she went over to put an arm around his shoulders. She couldn't bear to see him so dejected. "It's not selfish at all," she told him sternly. "It's a normal reaction. You guys _do_ deserve a break."

One corner of Mikey's mouth pulled up slightly. "Thanks, April. It's good to know it's not just me." He blew out a sigh. "Now if only someone would let the world in on that idea too, we might get a holiday."

**.:…:.**


	10. Meditations and Conversations

**A/N: **Um… hi. *sheepish* For those who are still counting, it's been more than a year. Sorry about that. As usual, I know how the story is going to end, but I just got a bit bogged down in the murky middle part. I'm still not completely pleased with the writing in this, but I'm just going to bite the bullet and post it, because I know that if I don't then we'll never get this story finished. Onwards!

**.:…:.**

**Chapter 10 – Meditations and Conversations**

At some point, Ch'rell had closed his eyes for him. Probably all the better to laugh at his attempts to meditate. Now Raph floated in a dark space, trying to focus and sense Master Splinter's presence.

It wasn't working very well.

_Don't mind me_, thought Ch'rell with mock innocence. _I'm just going to sit back and enjoy the show_.

If he'd been in possession of his voice at that moment, Raph would have growled. _You're loving this, aren't you_, he thought at Ch'rell instead. He could feel the answering grin stretch itself over his teeth. Impatiently, he tugged his mind away again from the sensations of his physical body. He could remember Master Splinter chastising him as a child, when Michelangelo had first discovered his penchant for being incredibly irritating. "Just ignore him, my son," Splinter would tell him calmly, when Raph's teeth were grinding together so hard that his jaw might have cracked. "Just ignore him."

He could almost hear the note of weary patience in his father's voice. He caught the scent of incense, the brush of a velvet robe against his clumsy fingers. A small paw firm on his shoulder. And then, surprising him by its proximity, he heard Master Splinter's deep chuckle, instantly filling him with warmth. It was that rare, unguarded laugh that his father gave when one of this sons had truly taken him by surprise or amused him in some way. Raph didn't get to hear it all that often, but he treasured it every time. He let the rumble of it fill him now, as his Master's presence washed over him.

He knew that this was his father's core. It was something that he'd sensed the edges of in his previous training, but never before had he encountered it in all of its quiet glory. Splinter had opened to him, showing him what he had to seek within himself.

For the first time in – Raph couldn't even say how long – he felt _safe_. The relief of it left him aching.

He was inside a cosy, wood-panelled room. Sitting on the floor in front of him, looking him directly in the eyes, was a young Japanese man. Raphael had never seen him before, but this was Splinter's core, and he recognised him instantly. He was sitting in the presence of Master Yoshi. A great stillness came over him, a sense almost of holiness. Though he knew he was now deep in meditation, he could feel his own heart beating sturdily. Master Yoshi bowed to him in respect, and Raphael, wordless and not needing words, returned the gesture.

As he straightened up, the door behind Master Yoshi opened.

There had not been a door there before.

Raphael was no longer kneeling before Yoshi. Now he was the one standing in the doorway, inside a body that was not his own, suffused with a dark thrill of anticipation.

Unmoving, he watched as Hun entered through the doorway and as his attack took Master Yoshi by surprise. The larger man's fists smacked into flesh with the familiar sounds of violence. Raph was no longer in a surreal mental space of meditation; this was harsh, visceral, far too real.

As more Foot ninja entered the chamber, he saw Master Yoshi's eyes begin to widen with surprise, and the beginnings of fear.

Ties flew from the hands of the Foot ninja and bound Yoshi's wrists and ankles, holding his body immobile. Raphael stepped fully inside the room.

"Good evening, Yoshi," he said with cold metal in his voice. "I have desired to meet with you personally for quite some time now. I have some questions that I hope you can answer regarding some mutual acquaintances of ours."

Raphael stepped closer to Master Yoshi. His clawed gauntlet rested underneath the man's chin, tilting his face upwards to meet his gaze. He saw only defiance, but he was unimpressed. "Hun," he said to the enormous man beside him, "introduce our new friend to our methods of persuasion."

Hun's face broke into an unpleasant smirk. The ties that bound the kneeling man's wrists and ankles crackled to life, and he grunted in pain and shock as the electricity coursed through him. Raphael watched, with a mild sense of satisfaction. This little human pest had been interfering with his carefully laid plans for quite some time now. It was good to catch up with him and watch him squirm. Raphael always preferred his enemy on his knees before him – in their proper place.

When the man hung panting and limp in the ties, Raphael spoke. "We know that you are a Guardian. I have unfinished business with Mortu. You will tell me where to find him."

Yoshi said nothing, appearing quite calm except for his laboured breathing. After a few moments, Raphael nodded again to Hun.

He watched every minute of the methodic, business-like torture. To say that he enjoyed it would not be quite accurate. He had much higher aspirations than to cause pain, after all, and what use was the pain of this worthless human gnat? Hun, at least, seemed to be having fun. It was so easy to satisfy these humans and their delightfully violent urges.

Yoshi behaved as if his meaningless resistance was worth something. "Those who live without honour will end without honour," he ground out at the end of his strength, and Raphael almost could have been amused at the predictability of it. Humans and their bizarre concepts of honour. Growing mildly impatient, he reached the conclusion that he was wasting his time with this one. No matter. There were plenty of other paths to Mortu, other Guardians, and Raphael would get what he wanted in the end. He always did. That was his right.

He was distracted from his thoughts when Hun shrieked at the attack of a small rodent that had flown at him out of nowhere. Growing bored, he swiped the animal out of the way, sneering at Hun's pathetic whimpers. Raphael decided it was time to dispose of the garbage himself. He knew this at least would send a clear message to Mortu, though the coward would probably remain in hiding along with the rest of the Utrom unit under his command.

It didn't matter. Raphael was finished here. He raised his gauntlet, and barely bothered to glance into the man's eyes before he brought the sharp blades down. They cut through the flesh of the neck with remarkable ease. It was so quick that there was barely even any blood left on the metal.

He would leave his Foot soldiers to dispose of the body. His mind was already moving to more important matters as he left the chamber.

**.:…:.**

Raphael jerked out of meditation, or whatever it had been, with uncomfortable suddenness. Master Splinter was still sitting before him with his eyes peacefully closed. He didn't think his Sensei had witnessed the memory that Ch'rell had forced upon him, and Raph was glad. It had left him feeling dirty and depressed, as if he had defiled everything his family stood for. _You stand for nothing, now_,Ch'rell reminded him.

Master Splinter blinked his eyes open, apparently becoming aware that his student had left the meditative state. Ch'rell kept Raphael's face inscrutable, but Splinter did not appear discouraged. "I hope that today's exercise will assist you in the search for your own core, my son. You must be strong, Raphael. We will meditate again tomorrow."

**.:…:.**

Raphael was already losing track of time. His existence had narrowed to the openings of the dojo door in front of him, a series of visitors and meals and trips to the bathroom, watched over by a determined Donatello nursing his tranq-gun and at least one other vigilant brother. Ch'rell hadn't tried to make an escape again. Raph knew that he should feel relieved, but the passivity of his captor made him anxious. He could sense there were things Ch'rell was still hiding from him, cards that he had yet to play, and Raph had no idea what they were. There was so much that he had never known about the Shredder. He had never known that the Shredder could be patient, but it had become evident that Ch'rell had the ability as the days crawled past.

When the door opened the next time after his meditation session, Raphael thought that it was probably some time in the evening. He was expecting to see one of his brothers, but instead it was Casey who entered the dojo, his jaw set as if he were about to face a gang of Purple Dragons in a street fight.

"Mr. Jones," Ch'rell greeted him coolly.

Casey's mouth twisted. "Dude, don't call me that. It's weird enough as it is that I'm talking to an _alien_ in my bud's brain. Don't start chucking 'Mr.' around."

"Sorry, Case," said Raph's voice more easily, "I dunno what I'm sayin' sometimes."

"Yeah, well, I reckon you know exactly what yer sayin', actually." Casey looked him up and down, and for a moment Raph thought he almost understood what the PDs must have felt when that self-assured gaze sized them up before a battle. He wondered if his friend was going to hit him. But Casey only stood a few feet away, looking down at him thoughtfully.

"So that pink, blobby creature is the thing pulling the strings of the Purple Dragons, huh? Wonder what Hun would say if he knew."

"Hun serves his purpose within my organisation. Knowledge is not something I require from him."

"Your organisation. Yeah. So how long have the Dragons been on your payroll, exactly?"

Raph tingled unpleasantly as Ch'rell sifted through his mind, pulling the threads together. "Ah," he breathed in understanding, "you wish to know if your dear father's murder was carried out under my command. I'm afraid your father was not significant enough to be of any particular importance to me. Of course, the Foot had probably associated with the Dragons before then, so your father's death may have occurred under my watch. But the dragons targeted people for protection money all the time – what?" he said at Casey's thunderous expression, "did you really think your family was some kind of special case?"

Raph thought he could hear Casey's teeth grinding together. "When you get outta Raph's head, I'm gonna squish you so fast that you'll pop."

"Are you really in a position to be making threats, Mr. Jones?"

"I don't see no chains locking _me_ to the wall."

"I think you forget how vulnerable you are. Your friend Raphael, coward that he is, has betrayed all of your secrets to me. I know how to hurt you the most."

"The guys'll never let you go after April."

"Oh, it's not just April – they'd be expecting that. It's a shame – imagine what I could do to her in this body, with these hands. I could snap her bones like they were twigs. And she'd probably struggle, which would just make it worse for her."

Raph's stomach turned over at the images Ch'rell was conjuring up in his mind. April lying broken, three-fingered bruises covering her pale skin. Terror in her eyes as she looked up at him. Her mouth was moving, begging him with words he couldn't hear.

Raph rocked out from the vision, reeling from the intensity of it, just in time to hear Ch'rell finish a sentence:

"… your mother. I know her full name, the area of the town where she lives. I know she won't be expecting me."

_What the fuck?_ Raph snarled, absolutely appalled at the look on Casey's face. _Leave her outta this_. He could sense Ch'rell about to retort, but then he stopped to consider.

_Perhaps you are right… it does not serve my purposes for your friends to realise the extent of the knowledge I now have of their movements and locations._

Angel's apartment. April's new place, Casey's flat. The farm, he realised with a sinking feeling. Their last retreat, their safe place.

_Not any more_, Ch'rell thought, satisfied.

"Casey," April's voice came from the door, "is everything okay?"

"Uh…" he swallowed. "Yeah. No. This… is freakin' me out." He backed towards the door, not taking his eyes off Raph's chained figure. "C'mon, April. I don't think you wanna be in here."

April's mouth tightened at the corners, and rather than allowing herself to be ushered out she slipped past Casey and stepped further into the room. "I have some things that I want to say."

"You don't –" Casey began, but then he seemed to realise that she had made up her mind and wasn't going to be budged. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Okay," he said.

And then, after a moment, "Leo was right."

He let one hand rest on April's shoulder, and then left the dojo without saying another word.

April did not turn to watch him leave, but waited for the click of the door closing. When Casey was gone, she crossed the room steadily, a cool curiosity in her gaze.

Ch'rell examined her in return, without much interest. _A weak one_, Raph sensed his dismissal of her. He obviously hadn't bothered to read many of Raph's thoughts about April, if that was the conclusion he was coming to. Raph wasn't going to rush to correct him, though; let him under-estimate her. It was a lesson Raph had learned the hard way.

She kneeled in front of him, looking pensive. "So you're it, huh? You're the Big Bad. You're the one who's been giving my family hell. You're the one who burnt down my shop and tried to murder us all."

"Yes," said Ch'rell, bored, "I suppose I am."

"Did you ever think of maybe just getting a hobby?"

Ch'rell let the sarcasm bypass him completely. "We are in a curious situation, here," he said in Raph's voice. "You would very much like me out of your life forever, and you could so easily make it happen. All you have to do is unlock these chains, and I will get up and walk away with this body and leave you all in peace. Just let him go. I have seen into him, every secret compartment of his mind and heart, and I can tell you his life is not worth the risk you run. It's in your own best interests to be rid of him."

"Yes," April rolled her eyes, "and as a psychopathic murderer from outer space, I'm sure you'd be the greatest judge of human worth."

"I understand more about humanity than you can know, little girl. I've observed your ways for a thousand years."

"We still might surprise you."

Ch'rell raised an eye-ridge, an eerily Raph-like gesture. "Perhaps," he said, "but I very much doubt it."

**.:…:.**


End file.
